When Haley Badenhop looks at a blank wall, she sees an opportunity. The local artist’s colorful creations have been brightening up more and more buildings around town over the last few years, with murals outside Jackson Drug, Bin22, King Sushi, and most recently, the exterior of a new REI.
Badenhop’s REI mural, which wraps the south side of the building with cheerfully colored spray paint over corrugated metal, was one of four big projects she took on this summer, along with a dozen other paintings that already decorated the inside and outside of restaurants and shops around Jackson.
It’s fun to be inspired by what otherwise would just be a blank wall.
Hely Badenhop
Her temporary mural outside the Hotel Jackson construction site is a great example of Badenhop’s ability to bring beauty and inspiration to an otherwise uninspiring space. Hotel Jackson wanted to make the construction site look better for the crowds of pedestrians who walk along Cache each day, so Badenhop painted a large fox on the fence, with flowers and grass on the cement barriers out front.
“Most of all, I always want to make the mural an awesome experience and bring fun energy to the space,” Badenhop says of her goals when creating public art. “Since I’ve painted in so many different locations, it’s been interesting to chat with local people about what is important to them and to make sure I’m correctly depicting a piece that isn’t just something I think is cool, but works well with the area.”
Living in Jackson, many of Badenhop’s projects have featured mountain landscapes, skiing, and wildlife. When planning out a new project, she works with clients around town to understand their goals and come up with a design for the building.
After the design is complete on paper, the painting of the mural is fairly straightforward, just time consuming. But as long as I have the right primer, the correct dimensions, some good snacks, and a good audiobook, I’m good to go.
Badnehop
While approaching big, open spaces with a paintbrush isn’t new to the artist, she’s constantly challenging herself with new techniques and materials. For her mountain mural at REI, she spray painted corrugated metal, a paint style and surface that was fairly new to her. While it can be intimidating to approach a new project, she’s constantly inspired by the fact that the community encourages creativity and art work in public spaces. “I grew up in the country outside a town [in Ohio] of 400, and I find it quite amazing that here I can still get a small town feel but have amenities like Public Art and the Art Association that encourage such a variety of art,” she says. “I think it’s cool to see people at all stages of business working hard to accomplish what they want, and to be surrounded by ideas and different thoughts.”
