The Corner Office

What do you do for a living? Are there more windows, or walls? Down on the north corner of little Carroll Street, over twelve dozen artists punched in to work the late shift and put their mark on the side of that old Fulton Cotton Mill; Then, they let go.

This exhibit provides a retrospective of Cabbagetown’s accessible mural installation, designed to share with viewers a glimpse of the street; its immediacy, never-ending change, and the buried voices of those before us. Stacks Squares exists in time and space, and cannot easily travel, except perhaps through accepting its transience.

Stacks Squares is proud to be selected for Atlanta Contemporary’s On-Site Gallery, and thrilled to provide insight in our process: a site-specific mural installation on Carroll Street rotating three times per year. Ten individual 7’x7’ architectural features host continual renewal, with a broad range of cultural backgrounds and diverse talent from first time painters to professional muralists. Participants work next to each other, learning and mentoring, collaborating and celebrating the ephemeral cycle of creation and destruction. Each new round features new original work, with Guest Curators selecting from a diverse pool of applicants.

See something you love? It’ll likely be gone the next time you visit. Why do we bestow so much vitality upon potential loss? Surely, this work cannot survive out of its element. How could it possibly carry meaning away from that position, that brief shadow, that corner? The message and its moment drifts away. We’re left with unresolved loss, chasing an instant, eventually forgotten when another blossoms.

Image: Brooke Farewell, Round 1 Square 10