Despite the efforts of a mysterious vandal hell bent on destroying it, a community art project was resurrected Saturday thanks to the perseverance of a tightly-knit group of yarn artists. (Pun totally intended.)
"It was like a two-hour love fest this weekend," says Mary Goldsby, whose Urban Yarnage collective built and rebuilt the art display along the Heights Boulevard running path between 16th and 17th Streets.
"There were joggers giving us high fives and people calling out from cars showing their support. It was fantastic being about to turn this situation into something positive and affirming."
"It was like a two-hour love fest," Goldsby says of the reconstruction.
Urban Yarnage's reconstruction comes two weeks after the "yarn bomb" installation was ripped apart by a suspect whom one eyewitness described as “an older woman, shrieking in anger," according to the Heights-area Leader newspaper. The disgruntled art-hater remains at large, in spite of a $500 Crime Stoppers reward for information leading to an arrest.
"The City of Houston has been great in helping us," Goldsby explains. "We were given a two-week extension on our public art permit, which means the project will be up through July 14 rather than through the 6th."
Artists were able to salvage a number of the damaged yarn squares, many of which the suspect tossed into nearby trash cans.
In the aftermath of the attack, Goldsby reached out to supporters via social media to collect photos of people standing in front of the original display. The images, in turn, were printed free of charge by Houston's A&E Graphics (now part of Thomas Reprographics) and incorporated into the new version of the yarn bomb.
"In the end, this installation has no purpose in the world other than to bring joy to the neighborhood," Goldsby says. "And now we have the community literally designed right into it."
Vandalized no more — a Heights-area public art project has been reconstructed two weeks after an unidentified woman tore it to shreds.
