These buildings looked like shit before we started painting,” says Joshua Daniel, the tattoo artist at Electric Blue who spray-painted this version of the iconic Ali-standing-over-Liston image onto a dilapidated building next to the tattoo shop, on Broadway near Barret Avenue.
Daniel, who moved here from Indianapolis about a month ago, is one of almost 100 artists — from Philadelphia legends to Louisville’s own graffiti artist Brrr — who were part of a Spinelli’s Pizzeria-led project this summer that, in addition to the Broadway spot, decorated four of the local pizza chain’s six locations, plus the designer-toy store Ultra Pop! and a section of Jefferson Street between First and Second. Spinelli’s owner Brian Gaughan had wanted to do the project for years, but it wasn’t until he had enough property — and friends willing to lend their properties — that he started reaching out to artists. Ironlak, an Australian paint company, donated 210 aerosol cans, a number Gaughan more than matched with 350 cans and help from Identity, a custom-print and aerosol-paint supply store on Baxter Avenue. “Some people frown upon it,” Gaughan says. “But I come down that back alley on Baxter, and it’s a land of color. You can do beautiful stuff with aerosol paint.”
This article appears in the September issue of Louisville Magazine. To subscribe to Louisville Magazine, click here.
