Public Event Will Celebrate New Dewey Square Mural by Shinique Smith

Photo by Yiqing Shao

At last! The new Dewey Square mural is complete and ready for you to gaze at and ponder.

This year, the new public art installation is by Shinique Smith, a Tufts and SMFA alum whose work is also on view at the MFA in “Shinique Smith: Bright Matter” through March 1, 2015.

The new mural at the Greenway was just recently finished. Titled Seven Moon Junction, it’s an updated version of Smith’s 2013 work, Seven Moons, which you can also go see at the MFA. In her artist’s statement, Smith says she picked that piece because “its circular composition and color palette and the geometry of the building felt as if they belonged together.”

Forty gallons of paint are put to good use here. The bright bursts of colorful fireworks and flowers brought by Seven Moon Junction play off the surrounding flora nicely. (In the winter, it’ll be a warm light at the end of a bitter cold tunnel.) The brightness is also refreshing after the wall’s previous, more understated mural, Matthew Ritchie’s monochrome Remanence: Salt and Light (Part II). The work displayed before Remanence was another colorful piece by Os Gemeos.

“I’ve titled this work Seven Moon Junction in reference to the intersection where the mural resides, the merging of people and the joining of art and life,” Smith says.

This will be all too true on Tuesday night, when the Greenway will host an opening reception for the new mural. The free public event will include live music by Debo Band and Zumix, interactive art, and food (from trucks and the Dewey Square farmers market). Smith herself will also be in attendance.

Free, Tuesday, September 23, 5-7 p.m., Dewey Square Park, rosekennedygreenway.org.