By LESLIE EIKLEBERRY
Salina Post
SALINA — Civic leaders, artists, and Salina Area Chamber of Commerce members gathered at noon Thursday to celebrate the completion of the mural on the Old H.D. Lee Mill elevator.
The giant three-sided mural has captivated motorists and pedestrians alike in the 300 block of N. Santa Fe since artist Guido Van Helten began work on it in August.
Eric Brown, chamber president and CEO, talked about the importance of having the mural, not only for downtown, but also for Saline County as a whole. Brown said the mural has garnered attention from both Salinans and people from out of town, which has the added benefit of more dollars being spent in the community by some of those who stopped by to see the mural.
"Retail trade is our seventh largest economic driver for Saline County, and when those dollars get spent locally, they recycle through our community, studies say, between seven to nine times. You shop online, that dollar leaves us immediately. So, this is a big deal," Brown said. "People coming down and taking a picture, they're gonna hit, maybe, the coffee shop. Maybe they're gonna have lunch downtown. Maybe they're going to shop, even at one of the local box stores."
The mural was the first project of the Salina Kanvas Project. According to its Facebook page, "The Salina Kanvas Project is an effort by private citizens in Salina, Kansas to transform privately-owned spaces into spectacular, world class artworks that bolsters tourism and community pride."
Another Salina Kanvas Project mural can be seen at The Yard, 138 S. Fourth Street.
Travis Young, Vortex president and CEO and organizer of the Salina Kanvas Project, said the idea for a mural on the H.D. Lee Mill elevator has been in his mind for about five years. At the time, Young was living in York, England. Young's idea and a discussion with one of his art friends in York were the catalyst for the mural.
"I said 'hey, I'm gonna be moving to Salina, Kansas, and I'm really going to miss it (the York arts scene), but maybe I can get one of your artists to paint something downtown because we have these big ol' silos that are in disuse,' and he actually pulled up some of Guido's work and he said 'you should get this guy to go to Salina,'" Young said.
It wasn't until the downtown revitalization project was was going that Young decided it was time to call Van Helten. Young said he approached several Salina businessmen about the possibility of having a mural painted on the old H.D. Lee Mill elevator.
"I was like, 'hey, we have this idea of putting this up here because what's going on downtown is fantastic, but we still don't really have an Eifel Tower, something that differentiates Salina's downtown from other downtowns,'" Young said. "I know we have The Garage coming. There's other elements there, but we wanted to do this piece because we felt like it was really something that was unique, stands on its own, you can't see it anywhere else in the world, done by an artist who is world famous and has a big following that's out there."
Young said that before he began the mural, Van Helten spent six weeks researching and talking to people about Salina.
"He really kind of had a writer's block of sorts in what he was going to make here. It didn't matter if he was at a ball diamond, if he was at a church, if he was just talking to people on the street, it all came down to one thing: it's a great place to raise a family," Young said.
It was that concept that inspired the mural, which was created based on a collage of photos of children playing.
Young said the Salina Kanvas Project has a vision of doing many more art installations in town.