ROCK ISLAND, Ill. — Rock Island officials are seeking community feedback on proposed mural designs for the city's Arts Alley.
Arts Alley is one of the city's public spaces being renovated as part of the Rebuild Downtown Rock Island project. When work is completed, two murals will be displayed in the alley, covering a total of 4,000 square feet of space.
More than 400 artists submitted themselves for consideration to design one of those murals when Quad City Arts put out a call in January. From there, the list of potential candidates was reduced to 130. Finally, the Rock Island Downtown Alliance and Quad City Arts whittled it down to 10 options.
Those 10 finalists will be available for viewing at an event at Rozz-Tox on Wednesday, May 8 from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. The designs will be displayed gallery-style. with attendees having the opportunity to leave their input about the designs.
"These artists have extensive experience, having created murals nationally and internationally. Public art should reflect the community that it is in, and to do that we need our community to come out and be involved in this process," Kevin Maynard of Quad City Arts said.
The feedback from the event will be reviewed at a special meeting of the Arts & Beautification Commission at 5:30 p.m. on Thursday, May 9. The artists behind the winning two designs will be notified the following day, on May 10.