A Colorful Kitchen Mural
Project Chimps is getting a new mural for the kitchen! Olivia Schreiber has painted a visual representation of the fruits and vegetables prepared for the former research chimpanzees. This kitchen mural is a fine addition to the meal preparation area, especially since it’s one of the first places visitors first see during their tours.
Meet the Artist
Olivia studies art at Anderson University in South Carolina, which is also the state she lives in. She has driven all the way from there to Project Chimps in Georgia to work on the mural.
Olivia has made one mural before this one, which led her to appreciate the process of mural making and how fun they are to paint. That’s one reason she made the trip, but she also considered the opportunity to volunteer at Project Chimps a unique one.
“I saw what an amazing organization it is and I really wanted to just help out, especially because I could bring in my art and my talent to help other people and the chimpanzees,” she said.
Olivia’s desire to support Project Chimps has even inspired her to consider volunteering in the kitchen, where staff and volunteers prepare the chimpanzees’ meals – the very work she depicted in the mural. Rather than simply painting fruits and vegetables, Olivia wanted to give guests a glimpse into the care and dedication that goes into preparing meals for the chimpanzees every day.
A Mural as a Window
The kitchen part of the sanctuary is one of the first places visitors see on their tour. Before the kitchen mural, visitors could only see what goes on by looking through the window, which only offers a limited view. After Olivia came for an onsite visit and saw the preparation of the chimpanzees’ meals in action, she was inspired to create a mural that acts as a window.
The mural is not a real window, but rather a visual representation of what’s happening in the kitchen. The kitchen mural depicts many different types of fresh food.
“There are star fruits, watermelon, cucumbers, bananas, sweet potatoes, lots of different types of lettuce and radishes to show a variety of fruits and vegetables that we recognize. But they’re also interesting and beautiful and have a wide variety of colors.”
“I wanted to choose food that we associate with what we eat so we can see that these chimpanzees are getting fed very good foods.”
As a result, the mural ended up being a very colorful array of fruits and veggies, both visually interesting and a proper representation of the variety of options given to the chimpanzees. Not to mention fun to paint!
A Mural’s Process
Olivia started out by sketching multiple potential designs before selecting one she would use to paint the actual mural.
“I’m taking these plants and drawing them in different ways so that I can find what works best for this specific wall.”
The wall in question is 50 feet long and two stories tall. That’s pretty big! Due to that size, Olivia started scaffolding, something new and exciting since Olivia hasn’t used scaffolding before.
Scaffolding is using a temporary structure to aid in the construction of something. In this case, that something is a mural, and scaffolding lets the artist safely reach high up to paint.
As you can probably imagine, scaffolding requires a fair bit of bravery to be up so high. In addition to this, the mural was painted over one week in July, so weather conditions were quite hot. It was worth it for Olivia though, because of the satisfaction of contributing to Project Chimps, painting a meaningful mural, and interacting with the people here.
“I’m just so thankful for how accommodating and how timely everybody has been while working through the steps of this process,” she said. “They were all very appreciative and encouraging and did a wonderful job representing Project Chimps.”
Specifically, Olivia expressed gratitude to Ali Crumpacker, our Executive Director, and Deanna Stratton, our Manager of Administration. She also said Holly Chadwick was very thoughtful, Alyssa Wren was very supportive, and Nate Waite was very helpful and kind.
The process of creating the mural wouldn’t have been the same for Olivia without these wonderful people, and seeing how the mural turned out, it was a worthwhile process indeed!
A Mural with a Mission
Olivia wanted the kitchen mural to evoke an appreciation of what goes into providing daily care and nutrition for former research chimpanzees. She hopes it will make tours more interesting and generate more traffic for Project Chimps. The more people who learn about the chimps, the more people may give to help support their continued care. If you’re interested in learning more, consider scheduling a tour so you can see the mural for yourself!
