The Tower mural

I hate it.

I’m referring to the controversial mural in the Tower. The one that covers the side of the wall of The Well Community Church’s thrift store, with the skinny baby and the angry Matrix-agent guys looking down over the city and the morose two-faced guy, the giant mural otherwise known as, “The Wall with the Formerly Water-Vomiting Blue Lady.” That mural.

It scares me and it’s huge and ugly and I hate it.

When I heard about the controversy over its depiction of… whatever it depicts, I initially thought, “Wow. Another creepy mural in the Tower. Shocking. I wonder if this one will have multicolored mucous, too.” (For the record, it does not. Also for the record, I'm not sure if the mucous mural is located in the Tower proper.)

No, I do not understand the artists’ vision. I have no idea what the image is intended to convey, except that it makes the little hairs on the back of my neck stand out. It makes me feel creeped out and miserable and it makes my stomach upset.

I do not like rabid bunnies eating ham. I do not like them, Sam I Am.

But when I read it would be painted over, I didn’t like that much either. Well, sort of…

Here’s the dilemma: I hate this piece of art. CLEARLY. But… it is doing what art is supposed to do: it makes me feel. Horrible, yes; it makes me feel horrible and scared and like I am being watched, but still—what a powerful piece of art to make me feel so viscerally.

Art, by its very nature, should inspire feelings. Isn’t that the point of art, to make you think and feel and talk? To communicate a vision, thereby urging others to communicate? And this mural, more than any other recent piece of art, has gotten our community talking. About art. Like it, love it, loathe it—it is successfully doing what art is meant to do. And just because I don’t particularly care for it, doesn’t mean others shouldn’t be able to appreciate its freakishness. (I mean that in a good way.)

I think I mostly hate the baby. Where is his mom? Why did she paint his eyes all clown-like and then leave him laying there like on those vegetables? And what is with the two-faced guy? I want to sneak him some Prozac, maybe, if I can get past those evil looking guys in the background.

But… I do appreciate the detail work. The rock-like patterns on the blue lady (that is a lady, right?) are very interesting. And eventually I will force myself to go and examine it at length, when I get my courage up.

You see, art is a very, very challenging thing.