As we reported, Faile — with an assist from Colossal Media — was commissioned to create a giant mural in Hell’s Kitchen. As of today, it’s finished. Elements of the mural reference the building’s rich musical history, including the word “Imagine” up top.
321 West 44th Street is the original location of the Record Plant, a legendary recording studio where the who’s who of rock and roll royalty laid down their tracks. The studio opened in 1968. Jimi Hendrix’s Electric Ladyland was the first LP recorded there. Aerosmith recorded two albums there in the mid-1970s and on December 8, 1980, John Lennon and Yoko Ono finished the song “Walking on Thin Ice” at the studio. Later that day, the famous Beatle was murdered as he returned to the Dakota.
“When we first saw this wall, it was logistically bigger than anything we’ve tackled before,” Patrick Miller of Faile told ANIMAL this morning. There were also other challenges. The scaffolding wasn’t the type Faile was used to, but mostly it was the time constraint: Faile is mounting an exhibit that opens at the Dallas Contemporary on September.
“Given the time limit with the Dallas show coming up, there was no way to make it all work,” Miller explained. While Miller and McNeil painted sections of the Faile-designed mural themselves, they handed much of the large-scale manual labor over to Colossal. “We still paint a lot of walls and paint walls all over the world. This was just one of those opportunities. I think we would have painted the whole time if we weren’t trying to figure out the Dallas thing.”
“Working with the guys from Colossal is great. They’re really one of the best at what they do. It just seemed like a natural fit.” And since many of the artist they respect have worked with Colossal, Miller adds, “We never had any bones about that.”
(Photos: Aymann Ismail/ANIMAL New York)
