ABOUT THE CLEVELAND 230 MURAL PROJECT
2026 is the 230th anniversary of Cleveland, and as a muralist I wanted to commemorate this in a way that celebrates the city’s past and its people. The 230th isn’t normally a big anniversary, but I was in high school on the 200th and I’ll be pushing 70 when the 250th rolls around, so, the 230th it is!
My aim is to create fifty or more murals of various sizes, both interior and exterior, based on historical photographs, posters, newspaper advertisements, ephemera, and other documents and artifacts that reflect the city’s history. This will include the notable and the notorious, the good and the bad, the everyday and the extraordinary. Each mural will also have a caption explaining its historical context. I will work with you to unearth a site-specific reference, or I will paint anything related to Cleveland history more generally.
I am doing this with the cooperation of the Cleveland Public Library Photographic Department, which houses 1.3 million photographs from Cleveland’s past, as well as the Cleveland Memory Project at the Special Collections Department of Cleveland State University’s Michael Schwartz Library, which houses over 500,000 Cleveland-related photographs.
I will handle all necessary supplies. Small to medium sized murals (up to around 20ft x 20ft) can be completed in two to three days; larger walls no longer than a week. No special permissions are required for interior murals, but for any exterior murals I will handle all necessary permitting and contact any relevant city officials.
Pricing is flexible and negotiable. Additionally, if you don’t have room for a mural but want to support this project, various levels of sponsorship are available.
The hoped for end result of this project is a city wide tour through Cleveland’s past, a collective memory jog, and, cliche though it may be, that history will come alive. In addition to all of the finished murals, the project will be commemorated with 10,000 copies of a free souvenir map of Cleveland to be printed and distributed throughout the city listing all of the murals, locations, historical context, and participating businesses and sponsors.
My aim is to create fifty or more murals of various sizes, both interior and exterior, based on historical photographs, posters, newspaper advertisements, ephemera, and other documents and artifacts that reflect the city’s history. This will include the notable and the notorious, the good and the bad, the everyday and the extraordinary. Each mural will also have a caption explaining its historical context. I will work with you to unearth a site-specific reference, or I will paint anything related to Cleveland history more generally.
I am doing this with the cooperation of the Cleveland Public Library Photographic Department, which houses 1.3 million photographs from Cleveland’s past, as well as the Cleveland Memory Project at the Special Collections Department of Cleveland State University’s Michael Schwartz Library, which houses over 500,000 Cleveland-related photographs.
I will handle all necessary supplies. Small to medium sized murals (up to around 20ft x 20ft) can be completed in two to three days; larger walls no longer than a week. No special permissions are required for interior murals, but for any exterior murals I will handle all necessary permitting and contact any relevant city officials.
Pricing is flexible and negotiable. Additionally, if you don’t have room for a mural but want to support this project, various levels of sponsorship are available.
The hoped for end result of this project is a city wide tour through Cleveland’s past, a collective memory jog, and, cliche though it may be, that history will come alive. In addition to all of the finished murals, the project will be commemorated with 10,000 copies of a free souvenir map of Cleveland to be printed and distributed throughout the city listing all of the murals, locations, historical context, and participating businesses and sponsors.
ABOUT JAKE KELLY
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Jake Kelly is a Cleveland-based artist. Over the last 25 years he has created around 1,500 posters and fliers for various local clubs like the Beachland and the Grog Shop and internationally touring bands. He is also a muralist and has painted dozens of murals around the eastern United States for clients like Melt Bar and Grilled, Condado, Mickey Mart, Nice Guys Pizza, and many, many others. In his spare time, he is the author and artist behind the non-fiction graphic novel series Death, Destruction, Vice, and Sleaze about Cleveland in the 1960s and 1970s. The latest volume, Death, Destruction, Vice, and Sleaze: HARDHAT WEATHER is a 500 page odyssey exploring the Weather Underground, bombs, nazis, Hardhats, pornography, outlaw bikers, busing, and more. It is due this year from from Pave the Ocean Press, Kelly’s publishing imprint.
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