Mrs. Collins’ redbud district mural
By Averie Grace-Hayes
If you take a walk down the sidewalk of the Redbud district, you might notice a new addition to the north-facing building across city hall: a beautiful mural. The mural has vibrant colors and an interesting design and depicts Oklahoma's state bird, a scissor-tailed flycatcher, along with the Redbud district emblem on the far end of the mural. This piece of art has been done by Owasso High School’s very own Shelly Collins.
Collins has wanted to do a mural in Owasso for some time now. She has painted many murals all around Oklahoma, including in Oklahoma City, Sand Springs, Bartlesville and many more.
“I really wanted to paint a local mural. I actually had my eye on this wall for a few months before I met [a city employee by the name of] Chelsea Levo Feary a year ago. She and I dreamed about murals in downtown Owasso. When the property owner reached out to her for suggestions for artists, Chelsea connected us,” Collins stated.
Picture taken by Mr. DeBella
With Collins’ connections and apparent passion for the project, her vision was clear: she wanted a mural that would capture the people of Owasso’s eyes and show her admiration for the town.
Collins excitedly stated, “It's the first thing drivers see as they are driving into town, east on 76th street, so we wanted to make a big impact.”
Collins started painting and planning the mural over spring break. Murals usually take a lot of time to plan and fully sketch out. Working with a larger canvas makes it more difficult to get the right perspectives for a complete piece of art.
Collins deliberately says, “I used a gridding method called the doodle method to enlarge my artwork. Basically, I marked up the wall with a bunch of random doodles, took a photo, then on the iPad, I overlaid the doodle photo on top of my design to enlarge it.”
Collins also had significant help from her family, especially her husband, Mr. Collins.
Picture taken by Averie Grace-Hayes
Collins’ vision for this piece of art had always been clear: to help create more joy and unity in Owasso.
“I want viewers to feel joy and be excited when they see it while stirring a sense of pride in their city. Ultimately, I hope the mural gives our community a deeper sense of place and gives the message that Owasso is a great place to live, work and play,” Collins earnestly says.
With that idea in mind, Collins worked for around 70 hours on this project. Collins has immensely enjoyed it, and it has turned out to be inspirational to the town of Owasso and also to Collins.
Collins happily stated, “I love it (...) I love being outside and hearing the trains, cars, etc. I am passionate about bringing beauty, wonder, and creativity to urban spaces!”