Besides the rising sun, it shows a stoplight hanging above a cormorant, a water bird that’s common in Illinois.
“I was kind of referencing what Chicago was like before it became as urban as it is now,” says Lewellen, 50. “I love nature, and I love all the little creatures. But I also really love concrete and light poles.”
Lewellen, who describes himself as an “urban imagist,” says he has seen a cormorant in a wetland reserve near his home and studio in North Mayfair and was drawn to it “aesthetically.” He says he included the traffic light to create “an overlap between nature and the urban environment. It kind of just ties in these two things that I feel like I’m kind of always wrestling with.”
Lewellen says that, when the community group Uptown United approached him about doing the mural, the narrow, six-story structure on which he painted it in October 2020 intrigued him. With “roots as a graffiti artist,” he says he’s always looking for a “dope spot” to paint.
“All the time, I’m driving around the city, and I see walls, and I’m, like, ‘Man, something would look really great right there,’ ” he says.
Uptown United was looking for a piece to “play up the lakefront theme” and also to promote the nearby Montrose Point Bird Sanctuary, says Justin Weidl, the organization’s neighborhood services director.
That clicked with the artist.
“I had a design that I had already been working on that I really loved, and I was, like, ‘You know what, let me see if they like this,’ ” Lewellen says.
He chose the colors, heavy on greens and golds, to make it feel “relaxing,” like an “oasis.”
The piece took seven days to complete, which Lewellen says wasn’t easy — in part because he is “scared of heights” and was working more than 50 feet above the ground on a lift that swayed back and forth as the wind blew.
Also, with the heavy equipment involved to get up there, at times it felt like he was “doing construction.”
“At some point, the creative part is over with,” he says. “Now, you’re just in production mode, and you’re just trying to execute the plan.”
But he says it became one of the favorite pieces he’s done.
“I like to know that I’m having a positive impact on the space and the environment where I create my work,” he says.
