Stock Island Mother’s Day Mural Scavenger Hunt May 10
Over the last year, Stock Island has been quietly and unassumingly beautifying the community. Spurred by the I Love Stock Island Initiative and the Stock Island Art District, creativity is popping up in the most unexpected places. On May 10, the Mother’s Day Mural Scavenger Hunt will highlight more than 20 of these works of art to be spotted and photographed around the island. A perfect activity for families and quaranteams to celebrate mom, participants can socially distance as they bike or drive using photo clues found on the Stock Island Facebook and Instagram pages. Gift certificates to Stock Island businesses will be awarded at random for picture posts tagged to the event. The details are outlined on the official event page https://www.facebook.com/
Stock Island’s newest mural, on the front of Carquest on Maloney Avenue, features 2000 square feet of National Geographic-worthy underwater splendor. Commissioned by Bobby and Michelle Mongelli, owners of Hogfish, Roostica and Geiger Key in collaboration with Carquest, the masterpiece highlights local delicacies including a large hogfish possibly about to be dinner for a nearby spearfisherman and a sizable stone crab. Colorful coral, reef fish and the jewel of the Caribbean Damsel fish hiding in a flowing purple sea anemone round out the scene. Somewhere hidden in the giant painting is a bottle of Corona, a humorous nod to the date the mural was created.
Artist Benjamin ‘Nevis’ Fauquenot said the mural represents 220 man hours, 120 cans of spray paint and 14 gallons exterior paint. Fauquenot is a native ‘conch’, growing up on Stock Island, works construction with Nearshore Electric and got his artistic start in the underground world of graffiti and then tattoo parlors. Now this self-taught talent and his teammate are honored to be giving back to the community in a way they can proudly put their signature on. Fauquenot noted he was given a lot of creative license after all parties agreed on a keys under-the-sea theme. “I watched hours of nature shows to capture the essence, did a digital sketch and then most of the rest was imagined on the fly”, he related. The team’s next project is slated to be done in time for the Mural Scavenger Hunt. “It’s a fun little beach scene landscape in a totally different style”, he said, “but you’ll have to find it on your own!”
Many other local artists have completed or are working on other mural projects, as well. Nick Soto and the team at Washed Up have spearheaded the Arts District proliferation even receiving a micro grant from the Awesome Foundation Key West to “create stunning murals and urban art…that will attract locals and tourists as a destination”. The relatively new Art Shack on Front Street has colorful painted facades on its individual artist’s studios. They plans to host community mural ‘paint and sip’ nights where large panels will be drawn out by an artist and ‘painted by number’ by participants in small groups. The panels will be installed in semi-permanent locations around stock island that otherwise don’t have large blank wall space. Still other murals have been around for sometime, just waiting to be rediscovered.
“I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised,” said Mongelli, who is also a board member in the non-for-profit I Love Stock Island Initiative. “Come find out what all the Stock Island buzz is about and celebrate Mother’s Day with us.”
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