Saturday was paint day at the Tacony LAB Community Art Center, with volunteers helping paint a mural for the new Veterans Village.
Barb Baur, coordinator at Tacony Lab, 6918 Torresdale Ave., invited veterans, their families and others to paint the artwork on cloth panels for installation outside Veterans Village, a corner property at 5127 Duffield St. in Frankford.
No special skills were required, as the panels were an oversized paint-by-numbers process.
Jon Laidacker, of Mural Arts Philadelphia, is the muralist for the project. He also painted the mural for slain policeman John Pawlowski outside the Parkwood Youth Organization gymnasium.
Kate Jacobi is serving as project manager for the veterans mural, roughly 1,000 square feet.
Mural sponsor Dana Spain visited the LAB on Saturday. The Joan and Bernard Spain Family Foundation is also sponsoring the mural.
Dana Spain is president of the board of directors of the new nonprofit VBC Giving Foundation, which is providing the affordable housing community for veterans. The 47-unit new construction housing community is expected to start welcoming residents in August.
Laidacker works out of a home studio in University City and will bring the completed paintings to the building, likely sometime in early September. The 28-foot by 36-foot mural will feature the Statue of Liberty, red, white and blue stars and the emblems of the U.S. Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force and Coast Guard.
Among those who stopped by for paint day were Mural Arts Philadelphia executive director Jane Golden, City Councilman Mike Driscoll (D-6th dist.), state Rep. Joe Hohenstein (D-177th dist.) and legislative candidate Pat Gallagher.
For more information, visit VeteransVillageCRM.com. ••
