‘Luminous City’ public artwork comes to life in downtown Mansfield

MANSFIELD — A colorful, downtown public art project years in the making became reality Thursday with the snipping of a bright red ribbon.

That’s when “Luminous City” officially came to life along Diamond Street.

“This is really just a celebration of all types of public art,” said Luke Beekman, chair of the city’s Public Art Commission and a leader of the Richland Community Development Group Arts and Culture Sector.

“So many hands have helped to shape this project,” said Beekman, an artist and founder of Mankind Murals Inc. in Mansfield. “We had this vision in 2018, actually. So this has been a long haul.”

“Luminous City” is a collaboration between local photographer, artists, and organizations invested in creating public art, designed to inspire artists of different mediums to collaborate in new ways, and transform an ordinary downtown lot into something extraordinary.

The new mural is the largest public art installation in Mansfield to date, complete with colorful spotlighting and nearly 400 feet of cafe lights stringing from one of the lot to the other.

Braxton Daniels III, a photographer, artist and owner of 3rd Cup Tea on Main Street, created a series of long exposure photographs at night in the Richland County area and in a landscape specifically along Ohio 603.

Vehicle headlights and taillights in a 30-second exposure cast a stream of light across a photograph.

During the initial phase of the mural process, the landscape photograph at night was printed on a 3-foot-by-4-foot canvas where Mansfield artist Robin Shoup created an array of colorful northern lights.

Daniels and Shoup both participated in the event on Thursday.

This composite photographic artwork was then photographed at high resolution, printed and enlarged on exterior vinyl and installed. The final size of the art installation in the Mankind Murals studio lot at 88 N. Diamond St. is 20 feet, 6 inches tall and 57 feet, two inches wide.

Beekman, a downtown resident for the last 11 years, commissioned the work as a collaboration that could represent the bright possibilities and express multiple artistic mediums and lighting in a downtown parking lot. He provided projection mapping for the project.

Matching sponsorship was made through the Richland County Foundation’s Mansfield Rising Plan, which is currently assisting matching funding through the RCDG Public Arts and Culture Sector for public art installations and mural project in the downtown Mansfield area between 1st & 6th Street, and Adams to Bowman Street.

The new mural was the first mural project to apply for and be approved though the newly formed city arts commission.

The project required additional permitting and construction to the commercial building, and all certificates and permits were applied for and completed by the arts commission and the city’s codes and permits department in March 2022.

Mansfield Mayor Tim Theaker was among those in attendance at the opening ceremony, which included the illumination of the mural.

“Today, in November, who would have thought we would be here … no snow and in shirt sleeves,” the mayor said with a laugh.

“This is the first one, of what I am hoping will be many. I congratulate you guys and I thank you very much for doing this and having this vision for Mansfield. It’s a great event,” Theaker said.

Beekman said hopes the project helps to pave the way for more public artwork, as well as additional artwork installations, and murals to follow the same process.

“I am proud to have been a part of making something like this happen,” Beekman said. “The future of this space is that we will be doing pop-up arts and culture events and other events that we can use to help further the movement of arts and culture here in Mansfield.”

Beekman said local engineering on the project was donated in-kind from Matthew Stanfield of FiELD9: architecture. He said Midwest Strut provided steel materials required for the additional construction. Andrew and Brittany Poehler of Hursh Pharmacy gave free use of the lot for the purpose of public art, he said.