Arts & Entertainment

Muralist Prefers Making Art For Public Viewing

When Strand, one of New York City’s oldest bookstores, invited muralist Michael Fumero to paint on one of its exterior walls, his first response was, “This is cool.”

Then, from roof to sidewalk at that East Village location, he brushed on shades of red, yellow, green, blue and light flesh tones to create an animated face that, at its widest, is six feet. He is, Fumero said, fascinated with human anatomy.

His inspirations for outside art come from various places, including comics, cartoons and the everyday things that families do. “The kitchen table, that’s where everything happened” in his own family, Fumero said.

Fumeroism is what he calls his art, said the high school teacher, asking that his employer not be disclosed. The people at Strand found about Fumero through another artist they had contracted to also paint murals painted on the same outside wall. “There’s just something about having an outdoor gallery,” said Jessica Strand, 45, the bookstore’s spokeswoman. Strand wanted something that was descriptive and fun, “a changing wall.”

Fumero is pleased to be part of that public exhibition, whose unveiling was timed to coincide with the March 2012 release of photographer Hank O’Neal’s book, “XCIA’s Street Art Project.”

Creating art in unconventional places is a big plus for Fumero, who started painting pedestrians can easily see in 2006. In addition to the Strand store on West 12^th Street and Broadway, his murals also are on the Lower East Side and in the Bronx, among other places. “I’m presenting it as a movement, a one-man movement,” he said. “I’m trying to do what I do on canvas and bring it to the people.”

Fumero said he is less interested in whether people actually like his paintings than in making sure his work evokes some kind of emotion. “I do what I do regardless of public opinion. However, public opinion—when it’s positive—is always a good thing,” he said.

Doing street art is less intimidating for Fumero than showing in a gallery, where the pressure to draw a crowd and to sell art is greater. “Don’t take it the wrong way; I’m not bashing galleries, but people get blocked [from the art marketplace] because of galleries,” Fumero said.

Though he teaches art and earned a master’s degree in art education from Kean University in Union, N.J., Fumero said he tries not be high and lofty about what he does. He doesn’t know everything about the subject of art. “You don’t need to know all of the art terminology,” he said, or to follow any other seeming rules of the art.

“I don’t date my canvas because, then, it’s not fresh anymore,” said Fumero, reiterating his pleasure at being an outdoors painter. “I love it. You’re on common ground with the art.”

On Twitter @ColemanKimmy.