Art Of The City 2016
PHILADELPHIA
MEG SALIGMAN
THE PHILADELPHIA ARTIST AND MURALIST HAS CREATED SOME OF THE CITY'S MOST ICONIC PUBLIC ARTWORKSINCLUDING AN INSTALLATION FOR THE POPE'S VISIT LAST FALLAND THIS SUMMER SHE REIMAGINES TWO OF THEM.
BY JOANN GRECO
Culture Feature As a young girl growing up near Buffalo, New York, artist Meg Saligman often came to Philadelphia with her family to visit an uncle who lived on a houseboat at Penn's Landing. Not surprisingly, after graduating from Washington University in St. Louis with a degree in fine arts, she found the lure of free housing in such a romantic setting, combined with the city's thriving arts scene, irresistible. "I fell in love with Philadelphia and never left," she says.
Thirty years later, Saligman has become an integral part of the vibrant cultural life that drew her here, having created such beloved images as Our Flag Unfurled in Old City. Painted on the side of a warehouse near the Benjamin Franklin Bridge, the mural was an immediate response to the events of 9/11. But now Saligman, 50, is meticulously restoring the piece so it will be ready to welcome the thousands coming to town for the Democratic National Convention in July.
Saligman's art career received its first major boost when she was invited to lend her skills to a work in progress by the Philadelphia Anti-Graffiti Network, which has since morphed into the large-scale public-art nonprofit Mural Arts Program. "The experience offered me three things I absolutely love: painting on a large scale, being outside, and working with people," she says. Since then, she has designed dozens of murals around town, often in an allegorical style that incorporates classical elements. "Philadelphia has distinguished itself in the contemporary mural arts movement," she adds, "and we have Mural Arts to thank for that."
Saligman continues to challenge herself. Last year she completed her largest work ever, the 42,000-square-foot The M.L. King Mural: We Will Not Be Satisfied Until... in Chattanooga, Tennessee, a richly hued tribute to an African-American neighborhood. Her delicately beautiful Knotted Grotto, an installation to honor Pope Francis's historic visit to Philadelphia last fall, encouraged visitors (more than 100,000 in all) to write prayers on white cloth strips and then knot them onto an armature. Those ribbons—now sculpted, layered, and embedded in glass—will adorn the façade of a new Project HOME residence for the city's homeless on North Broad Street.
Saligman will attend not only the Democratic National Convention but also the Republican confab in Cleveland to gather materials for an exhibition at Moore College of Art & Design, which will present her with this year's Visionary Woman Award. The artist hasn't yet nailed down the exhibit's specifics, but there's no doubt that once again Saligman will leave her mark on our city. "I'm very proud of my body of work," she says. "It's a great feeling when I drive by one and can say, 'I did that!'"
