Artists reunite to restore West Side ‘Hunger’ mural

Richard Schletty is one of three artists who created the mural in 1985. Each have been working under the hot summer sun to restore it.

Tim Spitzack
Editor

When artists Armando Gutiérrez G., John Acosta and Richard Schletty gathered in 1985 to create the 60-foot-wide by 12-foot-high “Hunger Knows No Color” mural on the south wall of the Captain Ken’s Foods building, little did they know they would be called upon nearly 40 years later to restore the artwork for future generations. But that’s what’s happening this summer. Over the past several weeks, the trio has been laboring under the hot sun to restore the mural to its original grandeur. They originally used family and friends as some of the subjects, so the images are particularly meaningful to them.

The restoration project stemmed from the need to repair the “canvas” of the mural – the brick wall on which it is painted. The building has a flat roof and rain and ice have coated the mural over the years due to a gap between the building and its gutter. As a result, paint was peeling in several places and mortar was crumbling between some cinder blocks. When building owners John and Mike Traxler, brothers and co-owners of Captain Ken’s, realized that the wall needed repair, they dug deep into their files and found the artists’ contact information. Remarkably, all three still live in the area and were available to help.

An example of how the elements had damaged the mural.

Captain Ken’s financed the building repairs of $3,400, which included installing a heavy-duty gutter above the mural and sealing the roof edge flashing. They contributed an additional $3,400 toward art materials, equipment rental fees and artists’ labor. Some of their employees even pitched in to caulk cracks and assist in other ways. The majority of the $17,000 needed to restore the mural was funded through a $13,600 Neighborhood STAR Year-Round Grant by the City of St. Paul.

When the mural was created in 1985, the portion of the building housing it was owned by Emergency Fund Service, now known as Second Harvest Heartland. The nonprofit cobbled together funding from three different sources to commission the artists to create a mural designed to raise awareness of the issue of hunger. Rather than use bright, vibrant colors, as is common for many murals, the artists used dark brown and white paint to create a grayscale effect, giving the mural a more somber tone. They worked on it for nearly four months. Today, they anticipate they will spend half that time to essentially repaint the entire mural.

This is not the first time Acosta and Schletty have helped restore the mural. Gutiérrez was not able to be reached in the fall of 2010 when the other two joined forces to freshen up and restore weather-damaged areas of the mural. That project was financed by Captain Ken’s, The City of St. Paul Cultural STAR program and the former Riverview Economic Development Association.

A reception to celebrate the restoration is expected to be held sometime in late August or early September. View the mural at 107 East Colorado St., St. Paul. For more details, visit hungermural.com.

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