12 Worcester Business Journal | August 22, 2022 | wbjournal.com
Congratulations
Thomas Cunningham!
Managing Director, Cunningham & Associates
Your Professionalism and Dedication is an
INSPIRATION TO US ALL
worcester business journal's
40 Under Forty
class of 2022!
for being nominated for
paint a mural for Elm Park Elementary
School. First, his passport was ruined.
en, his trip was delayed further due
to a hurricane.
Garcia came weeks later, at the
start of school, to paint a portrait of
a woman done up with hair curlers, a
reflection of a childhood carried out in
his mother's salon.
e kids would come and watch him
paint, and he made friends with one
girl. Her family was displaced by the
same storm that delayed his arrival to
the U.S..
"I don't think anything else would
have been as impactful for the little girl
her first week of school to see an artist
from her town painting on a wall of her
new school," Walsh said.
e magic of this meeting, though,
reinforces the need and the ignorance
related to all the picky things behind
the scenes.
"Nobody wants to see how
the sausage is made or stored or
refrigerated," said Walsh. "We're coming
up on six years for some of these
murals. We need to do some work on
them, which takes effort, time, supplies,
and money."
The impact of public art
For the Worcester Walls committee,
explaining the quantifiable community
and economic benefits of the murals is
tricky. ere's no numbering machine
tracking individuals supporting smaller
Artist Alex Ferror paints a mural at the Jacob Hiatt Magnet School. Artist Destiny Palmer works on a 2021 mural in Worcester's Main South neighborhood.
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