The Wall Project

 On Election Day, I passed a crew removing a mural, Crossroads by Daniel Galvez, which had adorned the side of Central Square Library for over three decades. In creating it, the artist had envisioned a family portrait of the neighborhood, incorporating local characters and even brushstrokes from the community volunteers who helped create it. It was one of many such public art projects in my neighborhood growing up, and one of the first images that springs to mind when I remember the Cambridge of my youth. These murals reflected and celebrated the diversity of our community, a diversity that was an essential part of our collective identity. I feel the loss of this testament to the past acutely. Its removal strikes me as such a horribly apt metaphor for what is lost through gentrification, a physical erasure of a community that only exists in memory. I have gone back several times to photograph the ghostly outlines and remaining paint chips that still cling to the wall. These are a few from the series I am calling "Erasure".