ANN ARBOR, MI - An elderly woman cooking pasta. A young couple enjoying their espresso. A group of people swimming on a hot day.
Kayla Turner can’t help but feel the pride in her countless brush strokes that now make up a mural on the wall of Bigalora Wood Fired Cucina in Ann Arbor.
Turner, a University of Michigan junior, recently helped create the art on the wall of the Ann Arbor pizzeria on 3050 Washtenaw Ave., Suite 112. She drew inspiration from Naples to fill four canvas panels that customers see upon entering.
Owner of Bigalora Wood Fired Cucina Mike Collins said he was “totally blown away” by the outcome of this collaboration with Turner.
“She just did phenomenal,” he said. “To have artwork done by somebody that is in the community is wonderful and the University of Michigan is a huge part of our community...It was exactly what we wanted.”
University of Michigan Art Professor Mark Tucker helped Turner make the connection with Bigalora. Turner has been a part of a group of students who have created other murals on the University of Michigan’s campus as part of one of Tucker’s classes.
Through her work in his class, Tucker saw Turner’s potential.
“I’ve been teaching for 24 years, and I’ve never come across a student like her who I thought not only had the talent and the skills to do this, but also, I knew she would have the follow through and the design skills and the business acumen to be able to pull it off,” he said.
Turner estimates each panel took anywhere from 30 to 50 hours to paint this past summer.
Turner said she was always the kid who was doodling in class. She began to take art a bit more seriously as a Lansing high-schooler during COVID-19. She first started teaching herself techniques, then she found an art teacher, Gabrielle Wheaton, who further inspired her.
As a freshman, Turner took a few of Tucker’s classes and fell more in love with art. She is now majoring in Arts and Ideas in the Humanities.
The 20-year-old estimates painting was only about 20% of the process behind the Bigalora mural, her first commissioned piece. She said she worked a lot with Bigalora’s graphic designer to create the final iteration of the project.
Turner opted for a collage approach with this mural and used a variety of photos she was able to find on the internet, in magazines and through archived photos. She also had to learn how to create a budget and a contract for the project.
This experience was a “steep learning lesson,” but she said she had Tucker’s guidance.
“I feel like I haven’t met a professor who is so invested in his students the way that Mark is because he really wants students to succeed and he wants them to do what they really love,” she said. “He wants to help that happen as much as he can.”
She painted each panel individually inside Bigalora over the span of a month this past summer. She didn’t get to see the pieces side by side until the mural was installed a couple weeks ago, but said she was shocked at how it all came together.
Her favorite part of the mural is the left end panel and the way she was able to paint the older woman’s apron, she said.
This partnership with Bigalora is something that Turner said she hopes can happen with other University of Michigan students and local businesses in the future.
“I think it can’t be overstated how important it is, because it’s a great thing for my career and a great thing for my portfolio. It also gives me more faith that I can pursue art after graduation,” she said.
After this experience, Turner said she would be interested in continuing to do large scale projects in the future across Ann Arbor, especially projects that collaborate with the public.
Tucker also hopes that opportunities like these can continue to open up for more students in the future.
“I wish we had opportunities to do this more often with more students and more businesses,” he said. “It proves the fact that students are really capable of amazing things if you can provide the opportunity, and they can rise to the challenge.”
