Monday, May 26, 2014

Open Letter to @JoeFairBairn, New Owner at Joe's Wooden Nickel: Kindly Restore Mural from @GHArtWalk 2010

Dear Joe Fairbairn,
 
I want to congratulate you on your restoration of the Rosebud facility. As much as all of us loved the Rosebud, we knew it was time for a reboot. It is to be praised how you opened the interior to the sunlight of sundown by cutting windows into the western exposure. It is excellent that the wall behind the bar is now an arched opening to the second room where music is often performed. I remember Anisa Hayes bringing in all kinds of great bands and we couldn't hear them in the main galley. Now the great sound goes everywhere. We look forward to celebrating our summer inside your hall of great food and cheer, made magnificient by the employment of Kicked Up Kitchen chef, Anthony Gonnella.
 
Anthony Gonnella is part of the Grand Haven Art Walk family, and it's admirable how he roasts an entire pig for us during the Centertown Block Party. As a man who walks Grand Haven, Spring Lake and Muskegon for art news, it is no question that you are a friend of arts and culture. All of the art talk eventually makes it way to my mailboxes and into the blog. Grand Haven Art Walk Five is gearing up for early Fall, and we can't wait to see what you bring to our celebration.
 
I make this request to a great man of the arts, a man who understands the power of advertising. Cutting the windows in the western wall made for an improvement of the bar and grill's main hall, bringing in natural light. Covering up most of the scene on a beloved mural celebrating Grand Haven beach culture might have been a hurried decision taken in a rush to open the bar and grill before the hundred days of summer starting Memorial Day Weekend. It's okay. It's interesting.
 
It's just that we celebrated that mural with incredible happiness in October 2010. It has been part of our street life for almost five years, and numerous visitors, brides to new residents,have stood in posed for pictures in front of its happy scene. Art is special in our city thanks to the Grand Haven Art Walk debut year, when we decided to put art first as we redesigned our city. Or as I wrote this afternoon to Jennifer Reyes, a talented photographer and an art consultant you trust:
 
What if art in Grand Haven really mattered? For example, at least as much as a pedestrian, who has right of way at crosswalks? Hence, we understand that the windows cut into the walls of the Wooden Nickel are important, opening the Rosebud Grand Haven interior to light. However, it lessens a mural that celebrates Grand Haven Art Walk 2010, our first. So I call upon the new owner to restore it by painting a bigger mural that restores all figures and incorporates the windows. Jennifer Reyes, would you kindly deliver this open letter?
 
Thanks for the consideration of my open letter to you. I assure you that a million dollars in publicity for Joe's Wooden Nickel will result from the reinvention of the Rosebud mural.
 
Sincerely
Captain Art Walk,
Chief Art Walker - Art Talker at Grand  Haven Art Walk
 
 
 
 
 

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