HARRISTON – Street artists are bringing a splash of colour to downtown Harriston with painted murals.
Mural Mania is a project by downtown revitalization group Harriston Rising.
Four different street artists from the GTA will be working on four different murals throughout Harriston over the next 10 days. Two murals were painted last summer which Keunen said went over well so they decided to expand on it for this year.
Taylor Keunen, marking and community development coordinator for the Town of Minto, explained Harriston Rising is a recent rebranding of Harriston’s downtown revitalization committee that includes community members, businesses and town staff.
To fund this project, Keunen said they had some OMAFRA rural economic development funding and they pooled money from the community and the town.
Keunen said there was a lot planned for this summer but the pandemic cancelled most of them.
“It was supposed to be like a huge street party celebration but with COVID we’re doing what we can,” Keunen said. “We didn’t want to cancel everything and this is something visual and beautifying the town. People can take it in while staying socially distanced.”
The four street artists and mural locations are: Blaze Wiradharma at the Royal Canadian Legion, Megan Oldhues at Harry Stone's Social House, Aidan Kenny at the Remax building and Matt Currie at the Service Ontario.
Currie, who is from the small town Port Hope, said they value creativity in his hometown and was excited to bring that to Harriston.
"It's cool to be coming here and contributing to a different small town," Currie said. "Just to be here and create something positive, it's going to light-up the downtown and hopefully bring in some attraction for businesses."
Currie said his mural will be messaged based saying "surround yourself with what you love." He is also incorporating an ice cream cone theme which goes with Harriston Rising branding the town as the cool cones and colour zones destination.
Social media is playing a big part in Mural Mania.
Harriston Rising’s Facebook and Instagram will be featuring content about the artists, videos and photos of the murals, pop-up events and anything special happening at the downtown businesses or restaurants during the two weeks.
“Then after that we will be launching a ‘mural moment contest’ so people can share photos with the murals and blast it over social media,” Keunen said.
Those who take pictures with the murals are encouraged to tag them with #HarristonRising and #MuralMania.
Keunen said projects done by Harriston Rising like Mural Mania are done to change the perspective of the small town.
“You don’t get to see many projects like this happening in small towns,” Keunen said. “It’s just kind of blossomed, all these murals popping up, trying to bring colourful, fun and unique things to downtown just to set it apart from other small towns.”
The murals are expected to be finished on Aug. 8. More information can be found here.
