Murals tell stories. Whether coded in the language of graffiti, offering bright bursts of colorful decoration, reflecting familiar faces or landscapes, or inviting us to spend time inspecting the intricate images in a collage, artists are often inspired to communicate through the blank walls in public spaces. Public art serves multiple purposes. It beautifies dilapidated areas of a neighborhood or city; it encourages and empowers community members; it provides representation and a sense of belonging; it reflects our history, or corrects false narratives; it relates the experiences of marginalized voices; it reclaims contested spaces and provides a sense of agency.

Starting with Cornelio Campo’s “Wings of a Migrant Butterfly” and the Downtown Durham Protest Mural Photographs in the Durham County Library’s North Carolina Collection, in this talk we will fan out across Durham, through the Piedmont, and from the Mountains to the Coast exploring the landscape of murals in North Carolina, and how they can help to energize and motivate communities in crisis.

Seating is first come first served, register to help us anticipate attendance numbers, and to receive an event reminder in the days before the program.

Sara Bell is a musician, folklorist, and educator living in Durham, NC, USA. She received a B.A. in History from North Carolina State University and an M.A. in Folklore from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and teaches courses in Southern Culture, Storytelling, Critical Thinking, and Women’s and Gender Studies at Vance-Granville Community College in Henderson, NC. She is a longtime member of North Carolina’s storied music community, composing, performing, and recording with her bands Angels of Epistemology and Shark Quest (Merge Records), Dish (Interscope), Regina Hexaphone, and Lud (multiple labels) since the mid 1980s. She has been a backup player with Jeffrey Dean Foster, Tres Chicas, Anders Parker, and others. Her research is focused on the intersection of music and language shift in minority communities in southern Italy, and on music, foodways, and language in Italian-American communities in the United States, particularly in the American South. An investigation into communal ovens in Valdese, North Carolina, which was settled by immigrants from Waldensian villages in the Italian Alps, has expanded to include other aspects of tradition bearing in the Appalachian foothills.