Artist Darius Dennis grew up watching the Chicago Bulls championship dynasty in the 1990s. Stacey King played on the first three of those teams to win titles.
Dennis had King’s autographed rookie card after the Bulls picked the former University of Oklahoma star in the first round of the 1989 NBA draft. Years after the 1990s dynasty, Dennis regularly listened to King after he returned and spent two more decades providing color commentary for Bulls games. Dennis remembers turning his television from the national broadcasts to the local stations, just to hear King.
So when King died in June at age 59, Dennis says, he knew he had to do something to commemorate him.
“If no one steps up to the plate and paints a Stacey King portrait before I’m free, I’ve got to do it,” Dennis recalls thinking.
So Dennis, a Chicago native who works full time as owner and artist with Big Wall Sign and Mural, painted it himself. His 17-foot-tall, detailed portrait of King, complete with an outline of the Chicago Bull mascot wearing a graffiti-style crown, is at Project Logan, a rotating graffiti permission wall behind 2929 W. Fullerton Avenue in Logan Square.
The mural also includes one of King’s catchphrases, “Too big, too strong, too fast, too good!”
Dennis painted the mural, he says, because in Chicago’s graffiti culture it’s important to do rest-in-peace tribute murals. Artists in coastal cities do it more than those in Chicago, Dennis says.
“Stacey King is the Harry Caray of our generation,” says Dennis, comparing King to the late Cubs’ legendary announcer. “He deserves to be painted and remembered.”
Others seem to agree. One weekday morning a Chicago Police car paused by the mural before driving on. And a man stopped and snapped photos, including selfies, in front of King’s image before he, too, went on his way.
“Stacey is getting his Bigsby & Kruthers today,” Dennis says, referring to the portraits of Michael Jordan and Dennis Rodman in the 1990s, when the Chicago menswear company added hand-painted images of the Bulls stars on its warehouse along the Kennedy Expressway. The murals reportedly caused traffic jams and had to be removed amid safety concerns.
Another mural by Dennis also went viral this summer. His portrait of folk music legend John Prine at Old Town School of Folk Music in Lincoln Square took off on social media.
“I didn’t expect it to get this crazy this quick,” Dennis says. “I’ve been scratching my head. Oh, I did that.”
While the Prine mural was commissioned, the King mural is one Dennis took on by himself. He picked the Project Logan wall because he respected it as a traditional Chicago graffiti permission wall, and he knows the person who runs it. Also, he loved Stacey King.
“I need one to two projects a year that are just for me and I can paint from the heart,” he says. This mural was that project.
“I watched all the championship games as a kid. I’m Bulls forever.”