Leopard print dances across the exterior walls, while three feathers float down rendered in careful detail, amiably clashing with the splashes of colorful flowers blooming across the high roof.
Across the street and a few blocks over, in a quiet upstairs room, a series of hands rise and move, embracing the blue painted air and inspirational words that surround them, in a silent tribute to hope and healing.
These images are a week or two’s painting work for Bob Palmer, pictured below, of Palmer Studios Inc. -- part of reflecting Chandler’s community character through paint.
“Murals become bigger than just you and the client,” Palmer said. “They become the community’s.”
Between May 8 and May 13, Palmer completed two murals in Chandler: an exterior mural on the walls of Gypsy Corner’s new building and an interior mural inside Helping Hands Community Foundation’s new office. These murals are some of the latest of Palmer’s numerous works throughout Oklahoma and beyond.
Gypsy Corner is a boutique store on 11th St. in Chandler, which recently purchased the old Route 66 gas station on the corner of 11th and Manvel Ave.
“We had a vision and a bottle of wine,” Gypsy Corner co-owner Bonnie Walkingstick said.
“That’s what we call a business meeting,” her coowner Debbie Collins said.
The co-owners had had their eye on the building for a while.
“I wanted to buy it because I just love the old building,” Walking stick said. “[... and] we wanted more visibility from the street.”
Although a reopening date has not yet been set due to ongoing COVID 19 social distancing concerns, the owners plan to keep their former building and add the new one into use as well.
After purchasing the property, the owners began remodeling the space including painting the inside themselves to match the funky vibe of their other, older location. For painting the building’s exterior, however, they turned to Bob Palmer, who enlisted the assistance of two of his former students: Chris Presley and Joel Randell.
“We knew that if anybody could get the feeling in this building that we wanted people to feel, it was Bob,” Walkingstick said. “Because you can tell him what you want and he listens and then he puts his own twist on it.”
Their design approach to the project was unconventional. The design covers most of the outside of the building in bright colors, turquoise and red, with flowers, cactus and a cattle skull featuring prominently.
“When [Palmer] came to present his idea, he said, `now, you know this is going to be a shock to Chandler?’” Collins said.
Palmer said he enjoyed the project.
“You want what I call immediate recognition,” Palmer said. “You want to be able to tell what you’re advertising, what you’re trying to say immediately and that isn’t always easy, and so I try to get into the client’s head about what kind of message they want to convey.”
The project’s message, as Palmer said Walkingstick described it, was “funky” and the reception to the mural was positive.
“I’ve been pleasantly surprised to see how many people like it, both men and women,” Palmer said. “[...] It was a fun project.”
Painting the mural took five days and was completed May 8. The following Wednesday, Palmer also completed an interior mural, May 13, in Helping Hands Community Foundation’s new building.
Helping Hands Community Foundation grew out of the success of Helping Hands Food Pantry, which seeks to provide free assistance to those in need. The building is the organization’s first and the concept for the mural illustrates their mission.
“What I told [Palmer] was that, [...] we wanted either something like lifting up people or holding people up because that’s our mission: to be able to help people,” Helping Hands Community Foundation director Sabra Denson said. “And just having those positive words of that people can [see] while they’re upstairs getting free clothes.”
The exact direction of the mural was left up to Palmer, although he said the words used were provided by the board members.
“I painted what I call multicultural hands,” Palmer said. “[...] There’s some that look more feminine than others, some are more masculine and they’re all doing something that looks like they could be helping.”
Helping Hands was pleased with the design.
“It was amazing in itself just to see his details in the hands,” Denson said. “Even the way that the hands are shaped and holding up. And then the next day when he came back to put the words on, it was like it was exactly what we were wanting.”
While the new offices’ ribbon cutting is currently delayed by COVID-19 social distancing related closures, the offices will open June 5 with services available by appointment only. Appointments can be scheduled by calling 405-215-2574.
Palmer is currently working on a book titled “Painting Oklahoma and Beyond,” which will feature images of approximately 300 of his works. Details of the book’s publication are still being finalized.