So I recently spoke to a muralist I know who's worked with and butted heads against the mural arts program.
To quote my source:
Quote:
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Legally, ownership (maintenance, decommissioning, intellectual rights etc.) of murals is sorted out ad nauseum in a Building Agreement between Mural Arts, the artist, and the building owner. Mural Arts' agreements are generally very generous to building owners, going as far as explicitly waiving the only intellectual protections artists have under law (called VARA rights). However, in exchange, their agreements typically require at least 30 days notice before taking down a mural, among other things. Mural Arts always does a ceremony and announcements before a mural is removed to manage community impact. My hunch here is that the developer started that conversation with Mural Arts, but never provided an accurate removal date. So it was a surprise that the mural was suddenly white washed. It was probably naive miscoordination on behalf of the developer.
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So at the end of the day Midwood may have jumped the gun and removed the mural without proper notice that they were required to and it looks like the Mural Arts is jumping on that to get some political points. The head of the program loves media attention, looking like a champion for the community and is hoping they can get Midwood to fork over a bit more cash for a bigger tribute as an apology/unofficial fine for not properly giving enough notice.
There also may be something to people really loving that mural even though it hadn't been around for a long time, but...yeah.
Like all of you, I don't agree with the PR campaign being fought by mural arts over what looks like a miscommunication on timelines by the developer. It's likely Midwood's fault for not following the agreement, but that doesn't excuse the mural arts unprofessional tantrum here. If they end up getting a few more bucks for the replacement piece, good for them, but it definitely puts a bad taste in my mouth and, I'm sure, in the mouths of some LGTB allies and many potential future mural arts partners.