The Steelyard mural is a part of the Rail Trail Initiative that is intended to reinvigorate the area with public art from various disciplines. The site consists of a raw concrete, 3 level parking garage facade and measures roughly 150′ x 30′ in height.

The initial proposal concept was deeply rooted in Depeña’s painting series “Matter”. It stems from a process which he loosely refers to as “Hybrid Paintings”, based on the various media and production methods used to create them. The series explores the spatial qualities of painting and drawing using topography, transparency, density of light/color, and layering to achieve work that utilizes chance and intention to create an encapsulated multiverse of compositions. When experiencing the work as a whole, you are introduced to the clear inspiration he gets from natural phenomena and when taking a closer look a much more complex set of micro-compositions or “mini worlds” are revealed.

The site is located along Charlotte Area Transit’s (CATS) Blue Line Light Rail. So another source of inspiration was the idea of incorporating movement. This was done in several way including long exposure photography layered into the composition and the usage of all 3 adjacent facades. Using all 3 facades, the pedestrian or light rail traveler experiences the mural from a series of perspectives and mentally unfolds the perspectives and stitches the composition together as a whole that wraps around the structure collapsing time/space.