A Series of Detroit Portraits

There are some interesting portraits on a couple of old, historic buildings in Detroit. They are big, beautiful, colorful paintings of historical, influential, political, and literary Detroiters.

I first noticed them about a year ago on a 3-story building on Grand River Avenue near I-94. The portraits on the building caught my eye as I was riding my bicycle up the avenue. The old turn of the century brick building is home to 16 impressive portraits that include Chief Pontiac, former mayor Hazen Pingree, community activist Grace Boggs, former Detroit city council member Maryann Mahaffey, Rosa Parks, Jazz composer Yusef Lateef, and many others. They are installed in the window openings of the building.

Grand River Avenue portrait gallery

Maryann Mahaffey – former Detroit City Council member

Helen Thomas, Yusef Lateef, Michael Alston (Wheel Chair Mike) and Tecumseh

Now I see that a few more have gone up on a vintage 2-story boarded-up building that is home to a liquor store on the first floor. That particular building is on Trumbull Street at the I-94 exit/service drive in the city’s historic Woodbridge neighborhood. Ten portraits are on that building and they cover the boarded up windows facing Trumbull. All of the individual portraits are Detroit literary figures. They include Naomi Long Madgett, Bill Harris, Lolita Hernandez, Terry Blackhawk, Melba Joyce Boyd, Philip Levine, Mick Vranich, Dudley Randall, Robert Hayden, and Sixto Rodriguez.

Trumbull Street portraits

The portraits are all the work of Nicole MacDonald, a Detroit based artist. They are part of an ongoing project called The Detroit Portrait Series. The current portraits found on Grand River and on Trumbull streets are truly some of the finest public art in Detroit, especially from a historic perspective. It will be interesting to see what comes next (and where) in this series of portraits.

Kudos to the artist Nicole MacDonald, nice work!