Berkeley Path Wanderers Association and Youth Spirit Artworks (YSA), a Berkeley-based organization that empowers underserved young people, teamed up to win a $3,000 grant to design and add a mural to an exciting public art project in West Berkeley. The money comes from Commotion West Berkeley, a group of merchants and residents dedicated to beautifying and promoting community engagement in the area west of San Pablo Avenue.
The mural will be in Jeronimus Alley — aka 5½ Street — between 5th and 6th Streets and from Cedar to Camelia. Because it also serves as a public walkway, it was added to the latest edition of our Berkeley and Its Pathways map.
Some walls and fences that border the alley already have eye-popping murals, but plenty of blank “canvases” remain. Lawrence Grown, who founded Commotion West Berkeley, has organized cleanup days in the alley. He says Commotion Berkeley hopes to obtain funding for a mural festival in an unpainted portion of the alley between Cedar and Virginia. He envisions the entire length of the alley someday being filled with art and becoming a popular attraction, similar to the richly decorated alleys in San Francisco’s Mission District, such as Balmy Alley and Clarion Alley.
Some sections of Jeronimus Alley already have murals, as shown in this view looking north. Photo by Lynn Bradshaw
BPWA President Janet Byron notes that BPWA’s participation in the mural project is consistent with the group’s mission to create and preserve “Berkeley's public paths, steps, and walkways for the enjoyment of all."
“Public art contributes to our enjoyment of Berkeley's paths in a ‘quirky Berkeley’ kind of way,” Byron says. “Residents have created guerilla art on a few of the paths, such as the birthday mosaic on Pinnacle Path, the lovely metal arch at the entrance to Vine Lane, and the heartfelt poetry scrawled on the fences of Tamalpais Path.”
New board member Tamara Gurin, who has long experience as a project manager and a particular interest in adding art to the paths, assembled the grant application in record time and is spearheading this effort. In that application, she emphasized that the project would both enhance and increase awareness of “an underutilized pathway in West Berkeley that is underserved with public art” and would “celebrate the history, character, and spirit of the neighborhood.”
Byron suggested that BPWA partner with YSA because she knew of the group’s murals in Alcatraz Alley Mural Park and its work on the Tiny House Empowerment Village in Oakland, which provides transitional housing for homeless youths. “It seemed like a natural fit to reach out to them about creating a mural in Jeronimus Alley,” she says.
Murals aren't the only artwork in Jeronimus Alley. Photo by Sandy Friedland
Sally Hindman, executive director of YSA, says the Jeronimus Alley project is consistent with one of the organization’s primary goals: to provide unsheltered and other underserved young people with jobs and job skills. “We also work to engage young people in neighborhood revitalization through the creation of murals, tile projects, and other public art.”
The grant will finance a mural 35 feet long and 8 feet high. YSA’s artists, ages 16 to 25, will design it and do the actual painting. Gurin predicts that the work will begin this summer and be completed in the fall. In the meantime, YSA will meet with property owners along the alley to solicit their cooperation and suggestions and will develop guidelines for the new mural and perhaps future ones as well.
The alley is named for Wayne Jeronimus, an official in Berkeley’s Housing Authority from 1976 to 1999. He fought for affordable housing in the city and was instrumental in making nine Victorian cottages on 5th Street near Cedar permanently available to low-income home buyers.
Muralist Wyn DiStefano combines elements of graffiti, a “love note” to his wife, and images of his childhood toys this section of his joyful mural, painted in 2019. Photo by Sandy Friedland
City leaders sought to honor the Housing Authority for that accomplishment. According to Grown, Jeronimus jokingly suggested that they could name the alley after him — so they did. In 1989, a small sign was hung on the back wall of the building that now belongs to Kermit Lynch Wine Merchant. Berkeley never sanctioned the name, however, so BPWA is working with the Berkeley Public Works Department to officially rename the alley and post signs.
Byron emphasizes that the Jeronimus Alley project will not detract from BPWA’s other work. “We still have tons to do maintaining and building the paths. But it's a sign of our maturity as a local nonprofit that we can add beautification to our priorities.”