It was an emotional yet inspirational moment Wednesday afternoon during the unveiling of a Sept. 11 commemorative mural outside Cheat Lake Volunteer Fire Department.
The mural is meant to honor the bravery of first responders and veterans after the Sept. 11 attacks that claimed 2,977 lives, including those of 343 fireman, 23 police officers and 37 New York and New Jersey Port Authority employees.
“That’s a lot of counting,” said Lt. Eric Tennant with the Cheat Lake VFD after reading off those numbers to the crowd. “In a world consumed by negative, I challenge you to find the goodness, to shine your light. To reach out a helping hand and remember our greatness is formed by our servitude to others.”
Unity and togetherness are key elements of the mural painted by 12 Fairmont State University students and Joel Dugan, professor of art and chair of Architecture, Art, and Design at FSU.
“One thing I think about is how unified we were and how we were not divided as a nation,” Dugan said. “We found when the threads of our civil sectors came together, that we were stronger than I think we’ve ever been before.
“As we look at the pillars of our service sector and we think about those who pledged so much of their lives for ‘We Before Me’ and the selflessness of that commitment, I think you’ll really understand how the metaphors within the painting developed.”
The mural features three active first responders in Monongalia County who are looking out onto the landscape, followed by a blooming tree a tree representing a tree that still exists at Ground Zero that blooms and loses petals every year.
In the painting, the tree resembles a heart shape with one side losing petals in mourning of the lives lost at Ground Zero.
The center of the mural features a memorial with three flags representing the next phase of the mural project which will see the flags erected before the mural and lighted, followed by paving the area, Dugan explained.
Further in the background of the image, the sky above the rolling hills is banded with a red, white and blue stripe.
The final image is of a fire ladder extending from a truck to a young person representing what Dugan explained symbolizes “young people that are called to action and understand what it means to give back to their community.”
The young artists who painted the mural were not alive when the event occurred so have only learned of it through footage and stories from older relatives.
Dugan said the project provided an opportunity to reeducate our youth with a call to action that is so significant to who we are as a nation.
The artists worked with first responders and heard their first-hand accounts of what responding to the Sept. 11 crisis was like and how it shook their foundation. They also painted the mural collaboratively, with no one hand painting any single element.
“Everyone in my life that’s older has always told me stories about it and I’ve seen footage all through elementary, so I have a good idea how awful that was,” said Gabby Reyna, one of the students who worked on the project. “I think working on it actually kind of opened my eyes more to it because we were interviewing people who work in that type of career and every time I painted a person or a landscape it was in memorial of them, so it was eye-opening.”
The event was a partnership between the United Way of Monongalia and Preston Counties, Cheat Lake VFD, Precision One Builders LLC, who built the mural wall, and the Fairmont State Art Department.
The mural was financed by The Organizational Arts Grant, made possible through a collaborative effort between Your Community Foundation of North Central West Virginia, Inc. and Arts Council of Greater Morgantown, with funding from the City of Morgantown – City Hall, the Monongalia County Commission and the Douglas H. Tanner Memorial Fund for the Arts. This project is presented in part with financial assistance from the West Virginia Department of Arts, Culture and History with approval from the West Virginia Commission on the Arts.
“If done right, art in many ways is a timekeeper that outlines the importance of the human condition and the struggles that we overcome,” Dugan said. “And this was a huge struggle as a nation.”
