Search the Web using terms like "graffiti" and "Penticton," and you won't find much positive commentary. What you will find is a ton of vitriol directed at spray paint-wielding vandals defacing private and city property.
And that's understandable. The town seems to have no shortage of them.
But graffiti has a whole other side. A side where soulless grey walls become vast swatches of colour and design. Where expressionism and artistry break forth from the confines of galleries to the outdoor world.
Penticton Art Gallery curator Paul Crawford just returned from Europe, where he says "there's tons of graffiti art there and it's a huge economic driver for a lot of European cities. They embrace it."
"There's bad graffiti, reckless stuff that doesn't mean anything, and that stuff sucks. But there's good graffiti too and with good graffiti, if you create spaces for artists to make really amazing art, you create a dynamic vibe that people travel to see, photograph and document."
He's right. Whether you call them graffiti artists or mural artists, they're a really big deal in many parts of the world. And in Penticton, we're just starting to get a taste.
The breakthrough locally for graffiti/mural/street art arguably came at the 2018 Arts Rising Festival. Suddenly, in a single weekend, huge chunks of brick and wood throughout the downtown core came alive.
One of the artists working that weekend was Brad Mulherin. Born in Drumheller and raised in Red Deer, Mulherin had recently arrived in Penticton for family reasons, bringing with him years of large-scale mural and graffiti art experience.
He'd met up with Renee Matheson, owner of prominent Penticton art gallery Matheson & Grove. Matheson liked what she saw and felt Mulherin had too much raw talent to be on the sidelines. So she found him some gigs.
One of those gigs was right there at Matheson & Grove, where Mulherin and crew would ultimately transform the building's south wall into a psychedelic Arts Rising wonderland.
But Mulherin's first statement piece in his new Okanagan home happened a month before that a couple blocks down the street at the corner of Westminster Ave West and Brunswick Street. And it too came through his newfound link with Matheson.
"I wanted to help develop this amazingly talented person into beautifying our area," she said yesterday. "And I'd met a man named Rick Staehli who owns a big building on Brunswick Street. He said he wanted to give back to Penticton. So I introduced him to Brad."
That piece, a hugely elongated mural featuring local flora and fauna, is highly visible today to anyone walking or driving west along Westminster.
"The building owner," said Mulherin, "wanted something local to the Okanagan. So I spent a long time researching flowers and animals native to the area, and worked from photo references. I drew a concept, but my art usually evolves as the work progresses."
It took Mulherin a month and a half to complete it. And even today the building's owner, who footed the bill for turning his big, blank wall at 351 Westminster into an art piece, is thrilled.
"The building was pretty dilapidated, but as we started cleaning it up, it struck me that we have a big white wall facing east on a major throughway. I figured it would be a good mural site, so Bradley and I had a discussion about what I envisioned. I think it's beautiful."
These days, Mulherin is becoming one of Penticton's leading practitioners of mural/street art.
"I've been passionate about it since I was a little kid," he said earlier this week in his studio, fittingly at the back of Matheson & Grove. "I first picked up spray paint about 20 years ago, experimenting with text and letters. I've painted at a lot of music festivals since then - live painting for festival goers and doing mural work before the show."
Mulherin's too humble. From 2006 to 2017, he organized a team of artists every year and was the feature painter at the Shambhala Music Festival in Salmo, BC. He's worked the I Love Hip Hop Festival in the Netherlands and the Bali Spirit Festival in Indonesia. His art is on display throughout BC and Alberta, and in more than a dozen countries.
Amongst his Penticton creations is an homage to Bill Nye the Science Guy at the rear of Sirius Science and Nature at 277 Main Street and the sophisticated façade at the recently opened Tratto Pizzeria Napoletana at 256 Westminster Ave West.
But his most recent piece, completed last Wednesday, might just be his most creative to date. It's on the back wall of the Roll N Stones Fun Centre at 1035 Westminster Avenue West, and as such you'll have to dig around a bit to find it.
It's worth the effort.
Yet much of the above might pale in comparison to the project Mulherin will undertake in the spring. It's at the Penticton Regional Hospital, and it’s a biggie.
"I'm doing a mural at the hospital next year," he said. "At the new part of the hospital, in the courtyard. I did a concept on the procreate program, so it'll be a scene of the Okanagan, with local hummingbirds, local flowers, ponderosas, possibly a butterfly, and an oasis."
Mulherin said the wall is being erected expressly for the mural after the originally targeted wall was found to contain an anti-graffiti coating. And he's dedicated this next creation to his mom, who passed away two years ago and spent much of her final days at the hospital.
It'll be approximately 36 feet wide and 17 high, and according to Matheson, it's being built by Greyback Construction. "Greyback owner Matt Kenyon kindly sponsored to build the wall for the purposes of the mural."
And one other thing for 2020. Matheson, certainly one of the town's foremost mural/street art advocates, is tinkering with the idea of a mural-centric festival.
"Bradley and I are thinking about collaborating on producing a mural fest in Penticton. So we're trying to pull together some of his crew. We'd go to the business sector and find walls, and do it that way. We're hoping for 2020."
In the meantime, Mulherin is shopping his skills. He's open to both exterior and interior murals, saying he'd use non-toxic, no-odor paint for the latter.
"Although some of the designs I paint might not be for everybody," he said, "I feel at this point in my career I can work with anyone's concept to paint anything."
Mulherin can be reached at 403-703-4915 or through Renne Matheson at Matheson & Grove at 250-488-4999.
