‘Black Lives Matter’ street mural planned in this Columbia neighborhood
Inspired by eye-catching street murals in major cities such as Washington, D.C., New York City and even Charlotte in the wake of nationwide protests this summer, a Columbia neighborhood hopes to make a statement with a street painting of its own.
Rosewood neighborhood residents are rallying support to paint “Black Lives Matter” along a section of Jim Hamilton Boulevard near a local park, small airport, brewery and urban farm. While street murals like this have become a trend in a number of cities, none have yet been painted in Columbia.
Jared Johnson is leading the charge, hoping to win approval from city officials for a project that “there’s a clear hunger for,” he said.
“First and foremost, I definitely want people to understand and receive that Black lives matter,” said Johnson, a 33-year-old Black man who has lived in the Rosewood community for five years. “It’s become almost cliché. You hear it all the time in media and see it on TV, but there’s still a large segment of people who don’t feel that way.”
Johnson said he was moved by the nationwide responses to the killing of George Floyd, a Black Minneapolis man who died at the hands of police officers, setting off a string of protests and a wave of renewed support for the Black Lives Matter movement. Floyd’s death — along with the high-profile killing of a Black woman, Breonna Taylor, by Louisville police — became a flashpoint for a new social justice movement across the country.
“You can still be in Columbia, S.C., a red state, and still show support for Black lives,” Johnson said. “It doesn’t have to be left up to just the New Yorks and the D.C.s, these different cultural hot spots or places that are known for their liberal causes and issues. ... You can still get things done.”
He reached out to local artist Margaret Carnes to design a mock-up for the mural. Based on input from people in the Rosewood community, the design features a raised fist — recognized as a symbol of both unity and protest — along with large, black block letters and rainbow-colored stripes backing the word “LIVES” in the center of the mural. The rainbow motif is meant to convey support for the LGBTQ community alongside the Black Lives Matter movement, Johnson said.
If the mural is approved by city leaders, people from all over Columbia would be invited to participate by stamping their own painted handprints on the mural. Johnson said he’s received enough offers of donations that the project would be completed at no cost to the city.
More than 450 people have signed an online petition voicing their support for the project, which Johnson hopes will encourage city leaders to approve it. But there are several hurdles to face.
It’s likely that the project would have to be approved by the heads of each city department that could potentially be affected by it, explained Lee Snelgrove, director of One Columbia for the Arts and Culture, which has spearheaded numerous public art projects across the city. And the fact that Jim Hamilton Boulevard, a city-owned street, is located beside the Hamilton-Owens county-owned airport potentially could introduce extra layers to the approval process, Snelgrove said.
Snelgrove has given Johnson guidance on how to move the mural project forward and said he sees the concept as a way to “bring attention to an important cause.”
Public artworks like the one proposed in Rosewood “unify people in a lot of cases, and it showcases the support of a city or jurisdiction behind Black Lives Matter and the goals of Black Lives Matter,” Snelgrove said. “We have always sort of preached about how the arts do allow for more civic engagement.”
This story was originally published July 30, 2020 at 2:39 PM.
CORRECTION: This story has been updated to note that Hamilton-Owens airport is a county-owned airport. A previous version of this story contained incorrect information.
