UTILITY BOX ART WALK / DRIVE

Shelter Island Drive & Anchorage

Artist Ann Walker, chose this scene of a boy playing with his boat on a bench. “It jumped out at me,” said Walker. “I looked at the benches and the serenity of the area – it was so peaceful. It looked like something I could speak to.” Walker noticed that the box is the same width as the benches in the area, so she decided to incorporate a bench into the painting. She also decided to honor the rich Portuguese heritage in Point Loma. “I went to the Portuguese Hall and looked at the flag,” she said. The boy’s striped shirt captures the colors of the Portuguese flag, and the boat he’s playing with captures the sea-faring spirit of the Portuguese. “There was this old Portuguese guy who came around every day to watch my work,” said Walker. “He said, ‘you really captured Point Loma.’ I thought that was really neat, especially coming from someone who’s lived here so long, and who saw so many changes. He said that many of the kids growing up here always wanted to go to sea.” It was important for Walker that the box fit in with the environment. “If you do public art, you have to be careful,” she said. “When you go to different areas around San Diego, you see some boxes that look like they fell out of the moon!” Walker also likes the fact that she incorporated a person. “When people walk by, they smile.” Even with all the good feedback, there were times when she had to force a smile. Like the time when she was laying flat on her stomach painting the bottom of the box – and the sprinklers turned on. “It was happy hour! Everyone walking toward [a nearby restaurant] got sprayed,” laughed Walker. Then there were the construction crews that came to rip up the parking lot across the street. She thought she was doomed, then one of the workers put up a cardboard barricade for her. “People were really protective of it,” said Walker. “People would tell me, ‘I saw people leaning on it and shooed them away.’” They were also protective of Walker’s supplies. She once left her paints at the site, and found that someone had turned them in at a nearby restaurant. Passersby did the same thing with a radio she had accidentally left behind.