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Mural artists could be coming to Pontiac
By Tony Sapochetti
tsapochetti@pantagraph.com
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PONTIAC — The Walldogs may be coming to Pontiac.

The Pontiac City Council decided Monday to invite the organization of artists to come to town to paint murals on downtown buildings. It also authorized Mayor Scott McCoy to assemble a committee to handle the details of the visit.

The organization gathers at a community to paint murals. In exchange, the host community provides liability insurance, food and lodging to the artists and a payment of $1,200 to a designated project leader of each mural.

Questions were raised at the council meeting last week about the insurance aspect of the event.

“I don’t object at all to this and I hope that we can find every reason to do it,” Alderman John McGlasson said. “I do think that we need to know these things in advance.”

City Administrator Bob Karls wrote a memo to the council saying IML Risk Management, the city’s insurer, assured him the city’s existing insurance would cover this.

McCoy said Karls asked IML all the questions the board asked about personal injuries and property damage.

“He asked all of those questions and they said that we were covered so (Karls) was very confident about it,” McCoy said.

Bill Diaz, owner and operator of Diaz Sign Art, proposed the Walldogs event and made a presentation about it last week to the council.

Diaz said that he has been involved with several Walldog events, including the 2002 event in Atlanta, and the communities became more attractive to tourists. The Pontiac murals could highlight the city’s heritage as a Route 66 community.

He said a Walldogs event takes a year to plan, so the earliest it could be in Pontiac would be 2009.

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Reader comments on this story - 3 total

Note: All views and opinions expressed in reader comments are solely those of the individual submitting the comment, and not those of the Pantagraph or its staff.

Some kids wrote on Sep 22, 2007 11:20 PM:

" will just get some spray paint and ruin them just to be punks "

When I traveled in wrote on Sep 18, 2007 8:50 AM:

" Germany and Austria it was a most welcome sight to see the beautiful murals painted on buildings, and even some homes had designs on them. There is a major difference between graffiti and art work, and I do hope Pontiac can carry through on this. I think high school art students could paint the sides of many buildings in various cities in Illinois to make them appear more appealing to the eyes. Could a business donate scaffolding for a tax write-off as a donation to the Arts? Think about it - beautify our cities in more than one way! "

on the cheap.... wrote on Sep 18, 2007 6:52 AM:

" There's a bunch of folks that specialize in this within the Chicago area. On every visit, I marvel at the wide variety of artwork presented for my enjoyment on the sides of business, overpasses, bus benches, and other locations. Many of these folks that perform this decorative art are quite good, and most likely work very cheap. I think that Pontiac should invite these folks down for their bid as an option. "
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