[garage door sliding]
♪♪
-I grew up in Rainier Beach,
and I rode the Number 7 bus my whole life.
[bus engine rattles)
[announcement bell chimes]
I like to say
I learned about life riding the Number 7.
It’s such a long route,
and it traverses so many diverse neighborhoods.
It's a little sampling of the world
if you ride the Number 7.
Rainier Valley has changed a lot.
So I'd like to preserve a little bit of that history.
♪♪
The Columbia Hillman Arts and Culture District,
they started putting the word out
that they had these small grants.
So I decided to apply for one of the grants,
and that's how it came about.
♪♪
[paint brush strokes]
I've always made art, and I started doing it
professionally about ten years ago...
when I found printmaking.
I love that the printmaking process
is so involved and it's so meticulous.
[metal gears click]
Printmaking is really deep.
There's so many different methods of printmaking.
There’s dozens of different processes and you can combine them,
so I feel like I found my home there.
The colors worked! About 20 years ago,
I told my husband, “I need to write
a short story called ‘Riding the Number 7.’”
I never wrote that short story, but I did a series
of collagraphs, which is a kind of printmaking
of the Number 7.
I started that about five or six years ago,
and this is the way I've expressed
my story of riding the Number 7.
[brush tapping]
I set an intention
in 2021 to work bigger. (laughter) But I wasn't thinking I'd work
this big so fast.
[laughter]
♪♪
To be really honest,
I learned that I still, at my age,
like to bite off a little more than I probably should.
♪♪
Another artist said, “You should put people on the bus.”
And then I started thinking about it,
I thought, “That would be cool to put people on the bus.”
♪♪
Jayashree, I knew that her portraits
really captured people in a unique way.
-Every time I pick up the brush after the first few minutes,
something else takes over.
I stop thinking and get into that zone.
And it does feel like that
when you're a
passenger on a bus, you just get into your own headspace.
♪♪
My part in this mural was to paint the portraits.
The amazing thing was to learn about all these people.
-My dad is the last person on the bus,
and my aunt is the first person on the bus.
The driver is Leah, and she drove the Number
7 for years.
The family standing in front
of the bus are Suzy, Lew, and Mondo Banchero.
They lived
and worked in this community for several generations.
And Suzy is really special to me
because she was my second grade teacher
and we did a lot of art in second grade.
And then everyone else, I would call them
heroes on the bus
because they were all people who were so involved
in making our community a better place.
♪♪
So many of the people here really
kind of move the ball forward in our community.
Each of them has done a lot.
-So funny that I just finished
painting this and now I'm cutting it.
It's a little nerve wracking.
Ahhh!
-But if we get through it, the theory is that
it should come apart without
without any problems.
We'll see how it goes.
[electronic tool drills]
-He knows what he's doing.
If it was just me, I'd be terrified.
-Here it goes.
-There we go.
-Sweet!
-Ha!
Way to go!
[truck engine whirls]
-I’ve got plenty of room.
[power tool drills]
-Part of the arts revitalization project
was to, like,
bring some life to spaces that needed some life.
And the bus goes right by here,
so everyone riding the bus south will see it,
and all the pedestrian traffic here will see it.
♪♪
(laughing) You’re so welcome!
-Thank you. -Thank you.
-We just found out.
And so we were luckily in Seattle.
-Hi, are you related?
-Yes! -She’s your mom?!
-Oh, my gosh.
-She you wanted to see her mom's painting.
-I’m so glad you’re here!
-Captures her perfectly.
♪♪
-Yep. There she is.
-There she is.
-I'm touched.
It’s just nice to be recognized!
I'm 60.
So, thank you!
-It's just been really exciting to see what she's done
with this. I just really love,
love the mural.
-I think it's so perfect because
he rode the bus a lot.
He didn't drive.
-Without these types of things
-statues, murals- things
that help us know who we are as a community,
it would be a very boring place.
Every every other place would look the same.
♪♪
-I don't know if he ever rode the bus, so...
but it's representative that he spent 95 years
in Rainier Valley, so it makes sense.
♪♪
-I hope they say,
“Oh, it's the Number 7!”
And then they look at the people
and they think, “Who is that?”
And then they learn more about their community’s history.
I don't know where it's leading next.
It's a journey.
You know, we're we're all on some kind of bus.
I'm on mine.
♪♪
[announcement bell chimes]
Check out Tina's mural on the north side of
Columbia City Gallery in Columbia City, and learn more about her
art practice at tinagarrickalbro.com.
♪♪
Catch Art Zone Friday nights at 8
and any time online at SeattleChannel.org/ArtZone.