 A portion of the mural was removed to make way for what will be a window for the new Sage to Summit shoe store location. The poor structural integrity of the building and the crumbling nature of the plaster the mural was painted on prevents the mural from being saved, despite the efforts of the Mural Society and Sage to Summit owner Karen Schwartz. Photo by Mike Bodine By Mike Bodine
Register Staff
3-14-2009 The first mural to be painted by the Bishop Mural Society has had a large chunk taken out of it, a reportedly necessary move for remodeling the building on which it was painted in 1997.
A door-sized hole, which will eventually be a window, has been punched through the south wall of the old Sierra Office Supply location. The building, erected in 1919, is being renovated for the new location of Sage to Summit apparel and shoe store.
The mural, titled “The Legend,” portrays a scene from Bishop’s pioneer days, as does nearly every mural in Bishop. According to the designer and one of the artists of the mural, Robert Unkrich, the mural depicts what that corner of Main Street in Bishop looked like at the turn of the 20th century.
Unkrich, a Bishop resident, said he was upset about the de-facing of a project he had spent more than two-and-a-half months working on.
“I was incensed,” Unkrich said of the day he saw the mural being destroyed. “I can’t believe the insensitivity of the owners to do such a thing.”
“I’d be mad too,” Sage to Summit owner Karen Schwartz said Thursday, if she had worked on something for so long and came upon it one day to see it destroyed.
Unkrich said he was not notified, nor did he know of anyone else with the Mural Society who was notified that the mural was going to be defaced.
However, Schwartz said that she had contacted the president of the Mural Society in July 2008 and again in November, but there was no further communication after that.
Schwartz quoted from an e-mail she had sent the society in November asking if it had made plans to preserve the mural. She added that she thought the mural was a “true asset to the community” and she was willing to make space in the new store to commemorate the mural, but there was no communication from the Mural Society after November.
“Catching people by surprise is not the way I wanted this to come out,” Schwartz explained of the apparent sudden and unannounced destruction of the mural. But, she said she thought she had done all that she could by contacting the group that oversaw the mural’s installation.
“Karen has bent over backwards to help us and try and save any part of the mural,” Bill Goodman, vice-president of the Mural Society, said Thursday.
Goodman said that the Mural Society has 10-year contracts with the building owners; if after that 10 years the building owner no longer wants the mural, the society does not have much recourse.
According to Goodman, he is aware of laws protecting public art, but decided to “take a common sense approach” to the project and do what was best for the community.
Goodman explained that with the poor economy, the blight of empty storefronts in Bishop and with no realistic way of preserving the mural, to pursue the matter would “put a grinding halt to Karen’s construction and that it (the litigation) would go no where but bad.
“We were saddened to see it go,” Goodman said, “But we don’t want to stop anybody or business. We are very supportive of Karen and her business.”
Goodman added that as a fellow artist, “I don’t blame Mr. Unkrich for being upset. When you’re an artist and you work so long and so hard on a project, you can’t help but take it personally when you see it come down.”
And the mural will come down, as there is no doubt that the structural integrity of the building is suspect.
Construction crews were on scene Thursday reinforcing the deteriorating ceiling joists of the nearly century-old building with half-ton, steel beams.
The studs in the walls are crumbling, and rotting from age and termites, said one of the contractors. He pointed out how the nails holding the studs to the foundation have rusted away and as the outer plaster wall buckles, it is pulling these studs out of position.
“The building’s ready to fall down,” the contractor said. “It’s going to take a lot of work to get it back together.”
He also explained that there would have been no realistic way to remove the mural from the wall as it was painted directly onto a thin layer of crumbling plaster. He said that even if the building was in good shape, the mural is on such thin plaster that it would be impossible to remove the mural, even in pieces, without the plaster crumbling.
Schwartz explained the new building will be split, east to west, with Sage to Summit occupying the south half, and a pilates studio upstairs. The north half will be available for lease.
Goodman explained that the Mural Society is still “alive and well” and is looking into a new technique for mural hanging. He said that murals can be done in pieces on moveable panels that can be added or taken down at the building owner’s discretion for maintenance to the mural or the building.
Goodman added that the society is always seeking new members.
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