Somewhat unbeknownst to most locals and students, Auburn displays many murals, most painted by regional artists. Two of these display musical icons from the late 20th century. A dancing bears fresco celebrating the Grateful Dead adorns the back wall of Moe’s Barbecue, in downtown Opelika, Rock N’ Roll Pinball, an arcade/bar, showcases a mural of the iconic rock star Stevie Nicks. The mural was painted by former local artist Brett Young and digital artist Josh Hamby.
In the mural, Nicks is surrounded by bright colors that appear to be ‘dripping’ down the wall, along with other installations such as a disco ball and eyes.
After completing smaller creative projects around Rock N’ Roll Pinball, like making t-shirts and prizes for trivia and offering creative insight on other initiatives, the manager eventually asked Young to help come up with a design for the wall of the ‘jailhouse,’ the primary music venue at Pinball.
Young settled on Stevie Nicks after careful thought.
“We wanted to bring the music aspect of the jailhouse outside and tie it in with the vibe and theme of pinball, and then add layers and different characters. I picked Stevie Nicks because she’s a girl who’s a rock and roll icon, and she’s different, and she’s someone I really like,” Young said.
The mural has a retro feel, and the wavy lines of color seem to represent ‘lines of music.’ Additionally, the mural ties in with many of the pinball machines inside.
“The theme of a lot of the pinball machines themselves is music-based. There’s a Beatles one, Led Zeppelin and Aerosmith, and they have a lot of retro stuff in the front: lava lamps and cool stuff like that. So we intended those colorful lines to be like a lava lamp, a little bit trippy, and then they flow like waves of music,” Young explained.
The mural also features a handful of eyes in various sizes. Young initially planned to have silhouettes of people in a crowd at the bottom to depict a concert, but they eventually decided to intersperse eyes instead.
“We wanted to figure out another, less obvious depiction of a crowd, so through the waves of color and sound, we came up with the idea of eyes to show people watching,” Young said.
Young cited the texture of the wall as her biggest challenge. They began the process by designing the mural on an iPad and using a projector to correctly get the proportions on the wall.
“The wall is very bumpy, and there are a lot of holes from the bricks because it’s a super old building, which made things really hard sometimes. It was really difficult to work on, especially because I’d never done that before. And I just really got to see how much time and energy it actually takes to do something like that,” Young said, detailing the experience.
However, she clarified that working with Josh and getting to hang out and paint with him was really exciting, saying, "The fun part made it easy."
Young, an Auburn graduate, moved to Denver in January. She is currently trying to make the transition into a full-time artist.
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