Summary: As you make way through the Times Square subway complex near the 41st Street and Seventh Avenue entrance, you will be greeted by two large scale mosaic murals created by artist Jack Beal. Arts for Transit commissioned Beal to create the artwork for the reconfigured passageway. The murals were completed in 2001 and 2005 respectively together they are a poignant representation of hope and renewal. Entitled The Return of Spring and The Onset of Winter, the work is based on the ancient Greek myth about Persephone as a metaphor for seasonal changes. Persephone, goddess of Spring, was abducted by Hades who is god of underworld. According to the agreement made between Hades and Demeter, Persephones mother and goddess of earth and agriculture, Persephone was allowed to return to earth and her mother for the rest of eternity provided that she ate nothing before leaving the Underworld. Persephone, however, spied a pomegranate on the way out and she could not resist taking a bite. Having tasted the pomegranate, Persephone was forced to renegotiate. As part of the deal, she was permitted to spend six months on earth, as in The Return of Spring, but must spend the other six down below, hence The Onset of Winter.Lets take a close look at the murals. Beals modern day interpretation of the myth is set adjacent to a subway entrance and a produce market. On the South mezzanine wall, The Return of Spring depicts Persephone reemerging from the underworld to join her mother. Carrying a bag of sunny, yellow daffodils, the springtime symbol, her return reinvigorates the fruits on the shelf of the market. A group of workers at the left are digging a passageway to open up the underworld. Meanwhile, Dante, the writer who famously observed the underworld, is visible in a green coat to watch the goingson. On the North mezzanine wall, The Onset of Winter completes the story. The second mural depicts a rueful Persephone at the top of the stairs, knowing she must descend but not wanting to leave her life on earth. According to Beal, the figure of Persephone quottwists in agony at the top of the stairs, knowing that she must go but wishing that she could stay.quot At the same time, a group of spectators and a film crew are present to document Persephones struggle. The Artist, his wife, and a group of friends were models for the characters in both murals. For example, the worker with a jackhammer on the far left side of The Return of Spring appears to be the artist himself. A friend serves as Orpheus, a poet and musician, who is heading down the stairs with his lyre case. Even Beals dog is shown witnessing Persephones descent in The Onset of WinterBeal captured the appearance of his models in an oil painting made to the scale of the intended mosaic. The Travisanutto Workshop in Italy translated the painting into small glass tiles. The mural was then fabricated in several sections and installed by Miotto Mosaics Art Studios with the help of New York City Transit. Like every project Arts for Transit commissions, this work is a closely collaborated effort among the artist, the fabricator, and the MTA. Beals use of the subway to illustrate the classical myth and its relationship between the aboveground and the underground provide an interesting counterpoint to the activity swirling in the station. Coming out of the abstract expressionist movement, Jack Beal is among a group of artists who sought to reintroduce realism into the vocabulary of 20th century contemporary art. In the early 1960s, he daringly abandoned abstract expressionism for realism. He is best known for his paintings, murals and fine draftsmanship. He often stated, I will never be satisfied until I obtain the believability of the seventeenth century Dutch painters. Interestingly, now his focus has turned back to abstraction.As with Roy Lichtenstein and Jacob Lawrence, place and time a particular place and moment, but with an implied universality are the theme to understand the Jack Beal murals in the public space. Time passes, people and things come and go, but there is always a deacutejagrave vu quality lurking just beneath the surface.
