Alonzo’s wall
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GREELEY, Colo. — Before the festival, Alonzo Harrison had never painted outside. In fact, earlier this summer was the first time he’d laid his brush on something larger than a canvas. But as he pilots his scissor lift to the base of the wall with a jerk and a laugh, it’s clear that Harrison is not the type of person to let such trivialities deter him.
“It’s a conundrum trying to get work without a vast portfolio. Everybody's like, well, you need more experience. And you're like, well, this is why I'm here,” said Harrison.
Harrison, 29, grew up in Greeley. He studied art at Seattle Central College, and now back home he wants to use painting and graphic design as a way to forge a new identity for his city.
Last week, Harrison joined six other artists at the inaugural WeldWalls Mural Festival. The five day festival drew hundreds of people to the WeldWerk brewery in downtown Greeley in what organizers hope will become an annual tradition.
The way Harrison remembers it, he was six when the art bug bit.
“We’d just gotten guppies as class pets, and for some reason, I was just like, I'm going to draw that right now. It actually looked way better than I could have expected.”
For Harrison, art is a gateway to the depths of his imagination.
“You kind of disappear into this world that only you know, and then eventually, you get to show that to people.”
As Harrison stared up at the wall he was about to paint, there was no time to be scared. First, he had to clean and prep the wall, massaging a white undercoat into every crack and pore.
“It really gives you a glimpse into how technical of work it is for people who paint buildings — residential, commercial, whatever,” he said. “You look around and you see all these painted buildings and you don't think anything of it, and then you do this, and you're like, wow, these people work really hard.”
After laying down the first coat in daylight, Harrison returned at night to project an outline onto the wall. A surprise rain shower prevented Harrison from starting to paint when he planned. He used spray paint to sketch his design, then switched to acrylic paint to add color and detail.
“For most of my time as an artist, my creative process has been pretty private. I finish it on my own time. It takes however long it takes, and I'm the only person watching. So it’s a little bit challenging just knowing that so many people are going to be watching,” said Harrison the week before the festival.
Seemingly overnight, the walls in every direction outside WeldWerks Brewery came alive in color. Spectators milled about, gazing up as the artists worked. Kids picked up brushes to work on a community mural.
And somehow, through it all Harrison kept his clothes clean.
“The sheer surface area takes way more time than I'm used to,” he said.
In past work as a graphic designer, Harrison has created illustrations on his tablet. Working 20 feet in the air and trading his cursor for a paint roller added to the excitement and challenge.
“Working on your tablet, it's so easy to just edit this, edit that, there's a lot less risk involved,” he said. “But with this, it's bigger. It's much more real and just way more effort, way more effort.”
Harrison’s piece, “Polaris,” is about “pursuing your passions, but also letting your passion take you in the direction it takes you,” he said.
The painting features a skull with gleaming eyes crowned by rays of light. In the top left corner, a pair of hands reach down, as if trying to pull the skull up.
“We are all a skull under the skin,” said Harrison. “And the hands are kind of like the guiding passion, that force, that love, whatever it is.”
Harrison’s piece reflects where he sees himself on own artistic journey.
“I see a lot of artists who are farther along their path. It's not a static trajectory. It's not like you're just going to be doing the same thing the whole time. But if you can somewhat blindly follow that love, it'll take you to places you didn't know you wanted or needed to go,” he said.
For the time being, Harrison can’t imagine a better place to be.
“People think that Greeley is kind of a cowpoke sort of place with just all agriculture and ranches, but it's absolutely not. We have so many artists, so many people doing great things,” said Harrison.
In addition to the community of artists the city offers, Harrison sees an opportunity to help shape the city’s identity.
“As Colorado’s growing, Greeley is rapidly growing as well. It’s even more important that we cultivate the identity of the city as it grows. What does that new identity look like? What does it look like for this community? What does it look like for me?”
Harrison may not have an answer just yet, but each stroke of his brush reveals something about himself and the story he wants to tell.
“Graffiti and murals give a better viewpoint into the community. What are the people doing? What are they saying? What are they thinking?”
Now, with a calling card in his pocket, Harrison hopes to take his work to other festivals, but he doesn’t want to constrain himself to just one type of art.
“I want to be prolific. I want to do more murals. I want to do covers for albums and novels. I want to do clothing.”
On the second to last night of the festival in late September, the sun splashed Alonzo Harrison’s wall in gold. The young artist knows there are more hurdles on the horizon, but for the time being, he can just be proud.
“It’s like what I’ve been hoping and dreaming and working towards is finally starting to bear fruit.”
All seven murals created during the festival remain on display at WeldWerks Brewery in downtown Greeley.