‘Baffled and angry.’ Mercer paints over Civil Rights mural featuring iconic black voices

Mercer University painted over a mural featuring prominent civil rights activists and black community leaders on Tuesday.

According to university officials, the mural — created in 2017 by artist Joerael Numina — was never intended to be permanent. But the artist, along with several Mercer professors and students, criticized the decision to paint over the mural and said the university didn’t communicate a timeline for its removal.

The mural, painted on the side of a building on Coleman Avenue in Mercer Village, featured civil rights icon Rosa Parks, former NFL quarterback and civil rights activist Colin Kaepernick, abolitionist and physician Martin Delany and Sam Oni, Mercer’s first black student. The mural was removed at the direction of university president William Underwood, Mercer said in a statement.

“The Mercer Village mural was commissioned and funded by the College Hill Corridor Commission several years ago as a ‘pop-up’ public art demonstration project. It was never intended to be permanent,” read the statement.

Baffled and angry

Numina said the artwork was “erased without any respect.”

“My general feeling is sadness for the Macon community and the disrespect for the black community and marginalized people,” he said. “You have the state constitution that protects over 300 Confederate monuments but then when there’s a mural to kind of counter that conversation or create an inclusive conversation visually to the landscape of Macon, Georgia... it gets erased without any respect, or with complete disregard for the communities that it’s supporting and the intentions behind it.”

Natalie J. Bourdon, associate professor of anthropology and women’s and gender studies at Mercer, was instrumental in bringing Numina to Macon. She said neither she nor Numina heard the term “pop-up” in relation to the mural.

“The overwhelming response has been that people are baffled and angry especially because the administration hasn’t given any sort of satisfactory response as to how the decision was made or why it was made,” Bourdon said.

Bourdon believes the decision violated Numina’s contract, which states Mercer would notify the artist before the mural was modified or destroyed, and the Visual Artist Rights Act of 1990.

The mural was the last project of the Art in the Park series, a project funded by the Knight Neighborhood Challenge Grant to create public art around in the College Hill Corridor, said Craig Coleman, a Mercer art professor. The project cost about $6,500, and Numina worked on it for two weeks in addition to giving two lectures and holding a workshop, according to Coleman.

“To me, it seems like this has the potential to end up being some kind of odd mistake because I can’t imagine any other reason why,” Coleman said. “I don’t think it was a target of anybody’s. Obviously a lot of people loved it given all the comments on Facebook and social media. It would be surprising to me if somebody had some negative reason for getting rid of it.”

Coleman said he wrote the grant originally for temporary art shows in Tattnall Square Park, adding there was never any discussion that Numina’s mural would be temporary. Telegraph reporting at the time also does not indicate the mural was a pop-up.

Student concerns

Freshman journalism major Conner Hendricks sent an email to Underwood late Thursday, telling the president his decision was “incredibly disappointing” and asking Mercer to reinstate a mural “that recognizes the accomplishments of African Americans and the leaders in their fight for equality.”

Hendricks noted that he is the third cousin of Joseph “Papa Joe” Hendricks, whom he described as longtime dean and administrator of the university, who fought for integration and inclusivity of African Americans on the Mercer campus.

“Papa Joe worked endlessly to include Sam Oni, and many other African Americans on our campus and lead to the integration of our wonderful university,” Hendricks said in the email. “Stories of Sam Oni’s denial of entrance into Tattnall Square Baptist Church and the night a cross was burned in Papa Joe’s front yard by the Ku Klux Klan have circulated through my family throughout my upbringing.”

Underwood responds

In an emailed response to Hendricks, Underwood noted that both Oni and Hendricks are widely remembered and honored on campus and by university leaders, including a portrait of Hendricks in Heritage Hall and a quote from Oni, who has frequently spoken at Mercer, on a nearby fountain.

“Memory of their legacy and contributions is hardly dependent on the mural that I allowed to be painted in Mercer Village as part of a class demonstration on street art,” Underwood wrote. “The mural was always intended to be temporary.

“My expectation was, and continues to be, to allow that space to be utilized by other artists, including student artists, in the years ahead. I am hopeful that future artworks featured there will make important contributions to campus and to the surrounding community.”