‘Ode to Old Town’ mural features the neighborhood’s most notable figures, venues
PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — An eye-catching mural that serves as an “Ode to Old Town” highlights the Portland neighborhood’s most iconic people and places, including the late Darcelle and the now-closed Jimmy Mak’s.
Local artist Travis Fields, who creates under the moniker Campo Graphic, told KOIN 6 the piece was his first work commissioned by the Portland Street Art Alliance. Using a grant from the city, the organization and Fields partnered with the Public Environment Management Office and Chevron to “revitalize” the gas station on 400 W. Burnside St. and the surrounding area.
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“With this site being right at the intersection of Old Town and downtown, it’s been kind of a cultural hub for the last several decades with just a lot of different cultures and scenes converging onto that area of downtown,” Fields said, explaining the inspiration behind the project.
Nightlife is the theme of the mural that depicts bar and lounge Tube, jazz venue The Jack London Revue and the city’s oldest strip club Mary’s Club, among Old Town’s other party destinations.
Travis Field’s “Ode to Old Town” mural features a Darcelle tribute. (Photo courtesy Portland Street Art Alliance” Travis Field’s “Ode to Old Town” mural features a tribute to the now-closed punk club Satyricon. (Photo courtesy Portland Street Art Alliance) Travis Field’s “Ode to Old Town” mural features a tribute to Portland jazz clubs. (Photo courtesy Portland Street Art Alliance)
Another focal point is the tribute to Portland’s record-breaking drag queen Walter Cole, who performed as Darcelle, who died at 92 in March of last year.
Fields worked on the piece from mid-December 2023 to late January, a timeframe he noted as atypical because mural projects are usually completed in the drier, warmer months. Although the artist recalls working on the coldest, shortest days of the year, he said he was protected by the overhang and lights wrapped around Chevron.
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According to the Portland Street Art Alliance, the mural has the power to illuminate “even the cloudiest of Portland days” — which could be a metaphor for something more.
“Being that it is a little bit of a troubled area down there, we have seen time and time again that when walls are brightened up with color — and they’re activated to an extent — that it changes the sense of energy around it, that it shows that these spaces are being considered and they’re not just kind of left to fall into disarray,” he said.
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