Mural unveiling continues CFA anniversary celebration

Thirty years of music, memories and milestones are being shared with UB’s Center for the Arts (CFA) through a new mural now on display in the center’s atrium. The mural features photos, highlights and information from performances over the past three decades and serves as a visual reminder of all the remarkable performances CFA has hosted.

“The amazing array of performers who’ve graced our stage is extraordinary,” says Jamie M. Enser, CFA executive director. “Our 30th anniversary mural highlights our emphasis on diversity and excellence in presenting both emerging and top tier creative artists. It’s a testament to the CFA’s commitment to our university audience as well as the general public.”

Enser and her team worked extensively on the design and curation process of the mural with community and university partners.

Julia Miskines, who graduated from UB with a master’s in arts management, recently joined CFA full-time after working there as a graduate assistant. Miskines coordinated with UB Archives to develop a vision for the mural.

“We started with a massive list of all the acts that have come through the Center for the Arts over the last thirty years. We went through the list and picked out which events to focus on and sorted them in about nine different categories of acts – including attractions, legends and genres like comedy, dance and theater,” Miskines says.

After selecting some of the top acts to highlight, Miskines, Enser and CFA Assistant Director Katherine Trapanovski began searching and reviewing a comprehensive list of past CFA events and pictures from the center’s records and university archives, and through news sources like The Buffalo News and Buffalo Spree — anything that could represent the history.

A discovery of autographed posters from significant performances gave the team at even more images to work with.

“We chose posters that best reflected our programming and were visually interesting,” says Miskines. “The signed posters will be incorporated as a unique piece of memorabilia.” 

Miskines says she enjoyed the archival research aspect of the mural, including working with negatives and contact sheets for construction photos of the CFA building.

“One fun aspect was learning about contact sheets and looking through them to select the best visuals of the center from its early days,” Miskines says.

One of the people Miskines worked with is William Offhaus, a reference archivist with over 20 years of experience helping people access the University Archives collections.

“It was great working with the folks from the CFA,” Offhaus recalls. “They had a clear idea of what they were looking to do and contacted us months in advance of the beginning of the anniversary celebration. This gave us plenty of time to search our collections.”

Offhaus says University Archives is often contacted by researchers seeking photos, videos, reviews and ads about people and bands who have performed at UB. How he accesses that information depends on how much information the researcher provides. With the CFA, Offhaus says they made things go smoothly by being prepared ahead of time.

The number of queries submitted by CFA to the University Archives for both print and digital media came to about 288 requests. Grace Trimper, who works with Offhaus in Special Collections, says that the CFA mural project was one of the more memorable requests they've received recently, both because of the size of the request and because of the collections she got to revisit.

One of those collections is the University Communications photograph collection, which contains thousands of digital copies of photographs from the 1970s through the early 2000s, though the majority of the collection represents UB in the '90s.

“I had a blast processing this collection and seeing how much our campuses have changed over the years,” Trimper says.

Because the CFA has hosted thousands of events over the past three decades, the mural is being carefully curated to include student and professional events, and continues to grow. Currently, the mural is in phase two of three. And while the photos are of utmost importance for the mural, Miskines and Enser are also curating a corresponding website explaining the history of the photos on display.

“The digital component is a timeline of events, giving context to the pictures. It includes details like when each photo was taken, background on the events and categories,” Miskines says.

The project is supported by partners Betty Red and DKM Sales, who provided expertise in materials and mural design. The design includes a placard with the CFA’s 30th-anniversary watermark, a QR code for digital access to historical timelines, and a mix of genres rather than a strict chronological layout.

The 30th anniversary celebration will culminate with CFA’s free annual community event — Spring Into Art — which is taking place on April 29.

“From concerts and plays to rousing musical arrangements, exhibitions and dance performances, the center remains a vibrant hub of creativity, where artistry and passion come alive on stage, captivating audiences from all walks of life,” says Enser.

“We want people to feel welcomed here. We want people to come and experience all the varying elements and diverse performances the CFA has to offer,” she adds. “Coming here during our free events like Art in the Open and Spring into Art is a great way for the community to explore the center and see how art is created and shared.”