Wyland’s Whaling Wall 82 — or what was left of it as of Monday morning
Robert Wilonsky/Staff writer
The vanishing of Wyland’s downtown mural Whaling Wall 82, now buried beneath pool-blue paint, has become a far bigger story than anyone involved in its disappearance ever imagined. Bigger, even, than the building-sized mural itself, which faced Field Street for 27 years — eight of them behind ads for cruise ships, airlines and light beer — and whose time of death late last week coincides with the arrival of FIFA World Cup.
One of the parties responsible told me Friday they were expecting a little blowback — “maybe” — when it was erased for a new mural to be painted by a local artist. That was before news of the whales’ demise made it all the way to the New York Post, CNN and Kacey Musgraves, who lamented the mural’s demise on Instagram by proclaiming that “we suck the soul out of everything.” Before The New York Times and the British tabloid the Daily Mail started calling. Before the legal threats. Before members of the North Texas FIFA World Cup Organizing Committee started receiving physical threats on social media.
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“This is not how I want to celebrate the World Cup,” the organizing committee’s president, Monica Paul, said Monday morning as tears rolled down her cheeks. “This is not how I wanted it remembered from the city’s standpoint. We still have a tremendous amount of work to do over the next three, four weeks. This was supposed to be a celebration of a young Dallas artist and helping share that with the rest of the city.”
Instead, the executive director of the Dallas Sports Commission spent much of the last few days in meetings, wondering how all this went sideways, wishing she could do it all over again.
“There were gaps in the process, gaps in communication,” Paul said. “Maybe assumptions that it had been vetted by all partners and all the parties involved. You work on something for so long …” A long pause. “You try to do good for your city, your region, to leave a lasting legacy for so many people …”
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So, then, how did this happen? After numerous interviews since my first column about this Friday, the answer appears surprisingly simple.
Because someone said: Here’s a wall you can probably paint over. And because no one else said: No.
“Multiple points of failure” — that’s how it was described to me Monday. Which doesn’t make it any easier. But it’ll be a good book title when FIFA collects its balls and goes home.
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The official dedication of Wyland’s giant mural of humpback whales in downtown Dallas in April 1999.
File photo/Dallas Morning News
Those failures were set into motion 18 months ago, when the local organizing committee enlisted the nonprofit Downtown Dallas Inc. to find suitable spaces for artwork commemorating the World Cup’s arrival in the region. According to Jennifer Scripps, DDI’s president and CEO, the organization spent that time commissioning a dozen local artists to work on 20 projects around downtown.
Said Scripps, the local organizing committee and DDI “shared a vision of imbuing this global event with Dallas artists’ work.”
In March, DDI reached out to Toronto-based Slate Asset Management about their parking garage at 505 N. Akard Street, suggesting its Field-facing side would be an ideal spot for a World Cup-themed mural. A Slate spokesperson said DDI and the North Texas organizing committee asked them to donate the wall for a public art piece, which Slate agreed to, wanting to appear as a good local partner.
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That’s right. Slate says it’s not making a penny off this. It’s receiving all this bad PR for free.
Paul confirmed Monday what I’d been told numerous times in recent days: Some people on the organizing committee had some obvious questions about the suggested spot. Like, aren’t those whales public art? And isn’t anyone concerned about the possible uproar over erasing life-sized humpbacks painted by the artist who goes by Wyland?
So on April 1, Shalissa Perry at DDI sent an email to Lynn Rushton, the public art program manager in Dallas’ Office of Arts and Culture, about that wall on Akard.
In an email exchange provided by Scripps, Perry said they were working with the local organizers to “identify a building for a new mural which will be a legacy project to benefit the residents of Dallas.” Perry told Rushton that the Akard wall was “the perfect spot, as the current mural there is over 30 years old and is past its useful life.”
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Perry asked if there were any “restrictions or rules around this being painted over,” because time was of the essence “to have the new mural done well before FIFA.”
On April 7, 1999, Wyland began his giant mural of whales on the west side of the Texas Utilities Building at 505 N. Akard St. in downtown Dallas.
File photo/Dallas Morning NEws
Rushton forwarded that email to Guy Bruggeman, the city’s Public Art Collection and Conservation Manager, who wrote that the existing mural was painted by Wyland — “who is quite famous.” But, he told Perry, Whaling Wall is not among the some 300 statues, sculptures and installations in The Dallas Public Art Collection. Nor, for that matter, is the Whaling Wall included on the city’s Public Art Walk.
“If you google Wyland mural dallas history,” Bruggeman told Perry, “it will give you a good briefing.”
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He ended his missive by providing a link to Wyland’s website. If that was his way of warning DDI or anyone else not to paint over the whales, it didn’t work. Neither Rushton, Bruggeman nor a city spokesperson returned emails sent and messages left on Friday.
Wyland and Steve Creech, the Wyland Foundation’s CEO and president, were never contacted by anyone in Dallas. Not until last week. Not until they started getting photos of humpbacks drowning in blue paint.
A Slate spokesperson, however, said they were assured Wyland had been informed his mural would be replaced.
The Dallas Central Appraisal District doesn’t actually list Slate as the building’s owner. A more familiar name shows up: a company tied to longtime downtown developer Shawn Todd and his sons Philip and Patrick. They acquired the parking garage around 2022, but haven’t owned it for several months: When the Todds began severing their longstanding ties to downtown, they forfeited the Akard garage to Slate, which had been one of the lenders on the nearby Energy Plaza makeover rebranded The Sinclair.
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I called Shawn Todd on Friday to get some clarity. And he launched right into talking about Whaling Wall 82.
“The artwork was epic,” Todd said. “It was a part of the downtown fabric. It projected a feeling and emotion that you would hope for in a piece of art that represented a metropolitan city. It was unbelievable.”
From about 2012 until 2020, Whaling Wall 82 was tucked behind SuperGraphics selling Virgin America, Carnival Cruises, Mountain Dew, Absolut Vodka and Bud Light. Todd said they turned down numerous offers to hide the whales once more, despite the allure of six-figure paydays.
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“My two sons, my business partners, have seen that mural their entire lives,” Todd said. “It was irreplaceable, because it was part of our community.”
I shared that with Wyland on Monday.
“It’s meaningful for me to hear that,” he said.
Wyland and I had been talking all weekend about next steps, which could involve a lawsuit alleging violations of the federal Visual Artists Rights Act meant to prevent the “destruction, distortion, mutilation or other modification” of an artist’s work. He called Monday to let me know a local law firm, which is next door to the Whaling Wall, was in the process of distributing a cease-and-desist to all parties involved.
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I haven’t yet seen a copy, nor had Monica Paul or anyone else with the North Texas FIFA World Cup Organizing Committee when I last checked Monday afternoon. But “the demand letter has been dispatched,” attorney Nick Roide confirmed.
“This is a national story because, yes, it’s Dallas, but if they can get away with it, then every piece of art a community loves across the country is exposed,” Wyland said. “I am going to do my best to send a very strong message.”
I guess that’s the next story.
The North Texas organizing committee was going to announce the new mural this week – the local artist responsible, the sponsor, the message. All of that has been sidelined for now.
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“Could I take it back? Yeah. I’d do it in a heartbeat,” Paul said when asked if she’d like a do-over. “But I can’t. And at the end of the day, I think you have to stand up and take partial ownership that you were a part of this process. But at the same time …” A long pause. “But at the same time, you have to continue making this event a success for the city and the region.”
For now, there’s just an ugly blue wall on Field, and an ocean of regret.