‘I Don’t Look Like The People That Are In That Sphere’ – Maine Muralists Pay Tribute To George Floyd

“Again We Rise” mural by artists Ryan Adams, Mike Rich and Jason McDonald features a portrait of George Floyd and the names of victims of police brutality, on the Aura Concert Venue and Nightclub building in Portland. (Willis Ryder Arnold/Maine Public)

During the first wave of protests in Portland over the death of George Floyd, three local artists painted a memorial mural for Floyd and other victims of police violence on the brick wall of a downtown building.

In his own words, muralist Ryan Adams talks about what he hopes the image will convey, and about what it is like to be an artist of color in Maine:

“The Maine landscape is what you see in a lot of fine art galleries around here. I am doing nothing like that. I don’t look like the people that are in that sphere, and I’m not painting like them.

“My name is Ryan Adams. I’m 35-years-old, born and raised in Portland, Maine, and I am an artist, muralist and designer. The entire wall was a collaboration between myself and two other Portland artists, Mike Rich and Jason McDonald. So we kind of started the discussion and came up with the idea of painting a portrait of George Floyd, and then the statement next to it, ‘Again We Rise,’ with the names of all the other people who have fallen victim to police brutality over the last few years. I shouldn’t even say all of the people, because when I started kind of digging in to find names to put on the wall, the numbers are terrifying.

“This is actually, to be completely honest with you, the first time someone has asked me about my experience of being a creative or an artist of color in Maine. That alone is pretty telling.

Read the rest of this story at Maine Public’s website.