PORTSMOUTH, Va. (WAVY) — A Potemkin village along High Street, one that hides urban decay, is bringing life to the other Wall Street.
“Seven facades representing, like, faux businesses to include a pet shop, a bakery, a record store. So it’s really fun. It’s a really fun project,” said artist Niki Park, on the team that created High Street’s Potemkin village. “The owner said, ‘What, are you going to paint the backside of our buildings?’ And that’s when we decided to just create a whole festival around this. The alley here is called Wall Street, and it became the Wall Street Mural Festival.
To prepare for the second-annual festival, San Diego-based muralist Venazir Martinez paints a dark chapter in Portsmouth history…