Spring Mural Jam

Words by Kaili Cochran

Now in its second year, the annual Spring Mural Jam is once again adding color and creativity to the walls of 14th and Hubbard streets wiith more than 40 local artists signing up to paint original murals. 

Unlike commissioned pieces, these murals are purely artist-driven, allowing artists of different backgrounds and skill levels to come together to network, collaborate and contribute their visions to a larger piece in the community. 

Emily Moody, chief experience officer for Phoenix Arts and Innovative District, and local muralist Elena Ohlander co-founded the event. What began as an idea in a group chat has grown into a community event.

“[Elena] and I started working together a few years ago. She started an Instagram group called Jax Wall Project,” Moody said. “It’s really grown into a place where we can share everything from, you know, artists’ commissions and RFPs for other cities to just news about the local arts community and shows that are happening. She and I paired up to start working on this event, and now we’re in year two, and it’s growing every year.”

One muralist is 16-year-old Zende Randolph, one of the youngest artists at the event. 

“I’ve been doing art since I was super little since I was drawing whatever I wanted,” Randolph said. “Most people kind of have a deeper meaning for making art, but not me. I just make art because it looks cool.”

Randolph’s mural is a scaled-up version of a galaxy character he created a couple of years ago.

“She can breathe in space, but she can also change her size to pretty much any mass. So she can be as small as a regular human or larger than the planet,” Randolph said. 

Myah Freeman, a Florida State University fine arts graduate, attended the event the year prior and painted a personal piece honoring her late father. This year, she planned to recreate this mural in more depth. 

“The mural [behind me] is of my late father, and I will be redoing it for this year,” Freeman said. “I want to zoom in and do a larger portrait so I can experiment with getting more fine details in my portraiture work for murals.”

Freeman returned to the event for the second year in a row because of her positive experience the first time around. 

“I really enjoyed it. It’s a great space for artists to come out and experiment, learn their skills, mentor and just to beautify the community,” Freeman said. “It’s a way of just seeing what I’m capable of doing. I’m very new to the mural industry, and I’m catching on pretty big, so I surprise myself a lot. I’m excited to see what I do today.”

Another returning artist Mike McIntire began his mural work at last year’s event and has since expanded his technique by participating in other mural events, such as painting for the 48-hour Film Festival. 

“My vision is showing, you know, you could be broken and beautiful at the same time,” McIntire said. “I just recently did this as a painting for a contest, and I decided I’d bring that idea out to a bigger wall.”

The initiative focuses on the concept of adaptive reuse, which is adding new life to existing spaces rather than building something entirely new. In this project, the Phoenix Arts District is transforming the previously empty walls into canvases for local artists. 

All murals painted during the jam will remain up for a year, allowing locals to pass by and admire the diverse approaches and messages of art by each of these artists until the next annual event, when the walls will be painted over again with new stories.