For a few days, at least, the giant hunk of granite just off Campus Walk looked less like a billboard and more like a big, colorful jewel. That’s thanks to adjunct professor of art and art history Christopher Mahonski, who sandblasted its surface to reveal its “rich color history.”
“The rock, for me, signifies an anthropocentric view of the world,” said Mahonski, who sees the tradition of spirit rocks on college campuses as a bit of a conundrum – geology vs. humanity, creativity vs. destruction, beauty vs. violence. “There’s something really violent about painting a rock.”
With help from a handful of Sculpture 1 student volunteers and a little self-funding, he spent days completing the on-campus part of the project, building a plastic enclosure around the rock and taking an assortment of power tools to its craggy surface.
A Nov. 18 notice posted on the enclosure explained the method behind Mahonski’s madness: “My hope is that these processes will reveal a rich pattern of color, emphasizing a collaborative history of rock-painting events.”
Years of well-meaning bulletins for all manner of student affairs, from Homecoming to club meetings, were reduced – or enhanced, however you look at it – to swirls of reds, pinks, purples and blues.
“It’s such a cool project and unique opportunity,” said senior Emily Dabbs, who helped construct the enclosure. “It made art a highly visible spectacle on campus.”
Mahonski, who holds a bachelor’s degree from Temple University’s Tyler School of Art and a master’s degree from VCU, both in sculpture, hopes to take his rock-blasting project to other campuses, including the University of Tennessee, JMU and Ohio State, and compile the results into a book.
In the meantime, he said, he found all the blasting and sanding relaxing and – you guessed it – also exciting. And though students promptly painted over the results of his work, true to the UMW Spirit Rock tradition, he couldn’t have been more pleased with the project.
“It was a way more intense, almost psychedelic, combination of colors than I would have imagined,” Mahonski said. “[But] I’m really psyched that it went back into rotation.”
