IT’S HAPPENING HERE:
Public art lifts the Lynn community

Al Wilson, bearded and a bit disheveled, grins and stretches out a hand in gratitude. “Thanks, brother!”

The driver is referencing the looming murals in front of us, in various stages of completion. They are the flagship project of Beyond Walls, Wilson’s creative placemaking initiative in Lynn, Massachusetts. The truck driver is one of many to stop him on the street  offering excitement and congratulations.

“I WAS looking for someone [to] help with the operational side of things,” says Wilson. They had connected once before through RAW Artworks, a Lynn-based nonprofit using art therapy to reach at-risk youth. Hill joined the project as a volunteer associate director, eventually leaving her role at RAW Artworks to dedicate herself to Beyond Walls full time.

Next to join was Pedro Soto.

“Pedro is a fantastic young guy who immediately bought into the project,” says Wilson.

Soto is a Lynn resident with a background in urban planning and project management. “I felt really excited about offering my skills and experience to a project right in my backyard,” says Soto.

Soto, of Dominican Republic descent, is also a Spanish speaker, making him essential to successfully communicating the Beyond Walls mission to the one-third of downtown Lynn that is Hispanic.

In addition to Lynn’s residents, Beyond Walls received support from local and state government figures. Through the MassDevelopment  partnership, state senator Tom McGee and state representatives Daniel Cahill and Brendan Crighton sent letters detailing their support.

“The arts have become an important part of the economy in the downtown, says Representative Daniel Cahill in a statement. “The  support of the community has been tremendous and I truly believe that this is a great step forward as we continue to revitalize the downtown area.”

The final Beyond Walls volunteer committee totaled 24 people: Hill, Soto and 21 residents and business owners, with Wilson as  Executive Director. It specifically included members that represented the breadth of diversity in downtown Lynn.

LAUNCHING Beyond Walls required the collective efforts of the team, but the driving force is Al Wilson. Wilson exudes  captivating charisma. He engages strangers with the friendliness of an old and close friend, often interrupting his own narrative to draw attention to a particularly striking mural.

It’s a quality that has served him well, allowing him to float comfortably between the community, the artists at work and among  business leaders in the boardroom in relentless pursuit of funding. Wilson appeared in person for every appeal for donations or grants over $1000, meeting with local banks and credit unions as well as individual businesses.

“In Lynn, the business leaders are optimistic,” he says. He would meet one-on-one with the decision makers of the companies,  discussing their business, their connection to Lynn and finally asking for their support at a specific monetary level.

Every meeting, even those that didn’t result in funding, built a valuable relationship. Wilson stresses that the key strategy was to end the week with more meetings on the schedule than when he started. “You always have to be selling and keep a robust pipeline,” he says. “Don’t be discouraged by the no.”

In all, Wilson held approximately 50 of these meetings.

He persuaded other organizations to contribute not only funding, but also in-kind labor. The International Union of Painters and Allied Trades DC 35 and International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 103 both provided physical support: the painters supplied the primer and prepared the walls for the artists, and the electrical workers plan to lend their expertise to the installation of the neon and underpass lighting.

Special events also contributed to the fundraising effort. Beyond Walls hosted a meet-the-team event at the Lynn Museum, attracting over 200 people, and the Blue Ox, a local restaurant, hosted an evening with a specialty cocktail, the proceeds of the drink going to Beyond Walls.

Boardrooms and business meetings are nothing new for Wilson, who came to Lynn from the private sector. Working for a Chicago-based start up, he opened the company’s Boston office in 2014 and moved to the North Shore. His morning commute took him through Lynn and re-oriented him to the city — he grew up in Walpole, Massachusetts and spent his childhood on the soccer pitch playing against teams from Lynn.

After two years, the company needed him to close a number of offices and relocate to Chicago.  Instead, Wilson walked away.

“I didn’t want to go through laying people off, I’d done that several times over. To be honest, I was burnt out,” he says. “I was left feeling empty. I made money, and that was a good run, but what did we really do at the end of it? What change or impact did we have on people’s lives?”

Staying on the North Shore, Wilson shifted his focus, prioritizing the  pursuit of community impact.

Wilson’s inspiration for Beyond Walls came from a trip to Wynwood Walls, a Miami industrial zone warehouse district turned street art destination. It began in 2009, spearheaded by the late Tony Goldman with six warehouse walls, and has since expanded to include over 80,000 feet of walls, unfurling into the surrounding neighborhood.

“I thought, what a cool story,” says Wilson. “It’s a really vibrant community, with tons of commerce on the street level — this guy takes asphalt with some broken down warehouses and he says in five years I’ll have this cultural Mecca, despite the fact that we’re inland, away from the hotspots. You’d think this guy was crazy, but it happened.”

SELECTING the artists for the Beyond Walls murals was an arduous process — street art is a world-renowned art form with  distinctive styles and genres, and the committee approved the best. They also required that those artists be representative of the cultural diversity in Lynn, looking specifically for artists who were themselves part of those cultural groups.

After releasing an open call for proposals, Wilson and the committee accepted 50 applications from both domestic and international artists and made a number of direct requests for work. They finalized a list of 15 artists whom they considered to be at the top of their field. One artist is Cey Adams, a distinguished Brooklyn-based graffiti artist and industry giant, famous for his work as the founding creative director of Def Jam Recordings.

“He did the cover for LL Cool J, he was there when they discovered the Beastie Boys, Mary J Blige,” says Wilson. Adams also  created album covers and advertising campaigns for Run DMC, Public Enemy, Notorious B.I.G. and Maroon 5.

“He’s got the best stories,” adds Wilson.

Adams also exhibits and lectures in major New York art institutions, including MoMa, the Brooklyn Museum and New York University. Despite his celebrity status, in Lynn he was as much a part of the team as anyone. He responded to the open application and stayed in the Salem State University dorms alongside the other artists while painting.