The epicenter of the Freddie Gray riots last spring is the setting for Baltimore’s newest work of public art.

A large mural featuring the images of jazz singer Billie Holiday and writer Ta-Nehisi Coates, both Baltimore natives, was recently unveiled on the north wall of the Arch Social Club at North and Pennsylvania avenues.

The mural was completed as part of the Art@Work: Sandtown program, a partnership of the Baltimore Office of Promotion & The Arts, Jubilee Arts and YouthWorks. The program created nine new murals and a mosaic in the Sandtown-Winchester neighborhood by pairing young artist-apprentices with master teaching artists.

The Arch Social Club mural, titled “Sankofa,” was painted by local artist Ernest Shaw Jr. with the help of street artist Nether and Eric Hendricks III, a graduate of the Art @ Work: Sandtown program.

African Symbolism

It combines traditional African symbolism and contemporary imagery.

Billie Holiday was born in 1915 and died in 1959, so this mural marks the 100th anniversary of her birth.

Coates, who is depicted in the mural with his son, is a 2015 MacArthur genius grant award winner. He is the author of Between the World and Me, an account of his experiences as a black man in America, and The Beautiful Struggle, a reflection on race, class and masculinity based on his years growing up in West Baltimore as the son of a former Black Panther.

Artist Shaw said the mural was a response to the events of last April. He told The Afro that he wanted to represent the past, “express the temperament of the children of today,” and portray “the future and what we should be moving towards.”