ALSO| Round Rock High School junior leads student voter registration drive<\/a><\/p>\nThis mural reflects Raasin in the Sun\u2019s mission of transforming spaces into places of pride, connection and community energy.<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery tile, every color, every detail carries the spirit of collaboration,\u201d McIntosh said. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t just one artist.\u201d<\/p>\n
Multidisciplinary artist J Muzacz said the mural is the tallest mosaic his studio has created and may be one of the tallest in Austin.<\/p>\n
\u201cChecking and taping over 300 square feet of those tiles, you start to go a little cross-eyed and start to dream in pixels by the end of it,\u201d Muzacz said. \u201cWe always say we have tiles for miles at the studio, and this is testimony to that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Muzacz\u2019s work is rooted in storytelling, community engagement, and cultural connection. Although installing siding or painting a wall would be easier, he said projects like this one take time from conception to completion, inspire conversations, and require the work of an entire community.<\/p>\n
\u201cDozens if not hundreds of hands were involved,\u201d Muzacz said. \u201cMosaics truly are timeless. Hundreds of years from now, let\u2019s ask ourselves, what stories do we want to be telling on these walls? I think this is a good one.\u201d<\/p>\n
Taylor\u2019s children, Roger Taylor Jr. and Rosalind Taylor Dillard, said their father graduated from high school in 1954 and later attended night classes at Austin Community College while working two jobs and raising twins as a single father. He served in the U.S. Army and later worked as a mailroom supervisor at the Veterans Administration until retiring in 1995.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I think about my father, the first thing that comes to mind is how much he believed in family, hard work, education, and community,\u201d Junior said.<\/p>\n
McIntosh and Muzacz considered eight to 10 mockups before arriving at the final design. Each image in the mural represents a part of Taylor\u2019s life. His high school graduation cap and gown symbolize his commitment to education, while the former Mueller airport control tower represents his efforts to preserve the structure from demolition in the late 1990s. A nearby plaza now bears his name.<\/p>\n
The mural also depicts Taylor\u2019s 1968 Dodge truck, which he used to serve the neighborhood. When Taylor asked the city\u2019s Parks and Recreation Department to plant trees in the J.J. Seabrook Greenbelt, he learned that the department did not have enough funding to water and maintain them. Taylor placed 50-gallon drums in the back of his truck and, with help from his son and neighbors, watered each tree nearly every day for two years, according to Taylor Jr.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy hat goes off to him,\u201d Taylor Jr. said. \u201cWith the mural facing toward the J.J. Seabrook Greenbelt, it\u2019s remarkable because it\u2019s almost as if he is looking over the trees and the greenbelt.\u201d<\/p>\n
This mural is McIntosh and Muzacz’s first official project they have done together after 10 years of friendship.<\/p>\n
Raasin in the Sun\u2019s Mosaic Workshop, located about 10 minutes away on Airport Boulevard, is open throughout the week for community members interested in making mosaics, taking classes or participating in future community mural projects. The organization will also hold its annual Mosaic Fest during the last week of October.<\/p>\n
\u201cThank you all for continuing to invest in the beauty and the strength of Austin,\u201d McIntosh said.<\/p>\n
Taylor\u2019s children said their father was devoted to serving his community but never sought recognition for his work.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy father was a humble man, and I can almost hear him saying, \u2018I don\u2019t know about all of this.\u2019 But I believe he would be deeply humble and grateful,\u201d Rosalind Taylor Dillard said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"AUSTIN, Texas \u2014 Five stories high and composed of over 70,000 hand-placed, 3-quarter- inch glass tiles, a new…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":443365,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,133],"class_list":["post-443364","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-austin","tag-austin","tag-austin-headlines","tag-austin-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/443364","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=443364"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/443364\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/443365"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=443364"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=443364"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=443364"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}