Local youth paints beautiful mural for Communities In Bloom, in what they hope is the first of many

The Whitecourt Communities In Bloom shed at the Forest Interpretive Centre has received a colourful
facelift. A beautiful, hand-painted mural on the far side wall has been intricately designed onto the
wood surface. Local artist Ally-Ann Romanchuk, 18, is the face behind the flowery art piece, which
Communities In Bloom hope is the first of several in the community. This isn’t the first public art piece
by Romanchuk, who has also shared her talents by painting a giant ice cream heart on the fence by
Granny Grays Hard Ice Cream and the colourful mural out front of the Community Lunchbox Society
office.
Early last week, Romanchuk was up at the Forest Interpretive Centre creating the magical, flowery
design perfectly suited for Communities In Bloom. “I’ve been painting seriously for about six or seven
years now. I sold my first painting four years ago and did my first mural a year ago. I’ve been doing art
since I was about two. I used to draw on the walls at the house, and it used to get me into trouble,”
laughed Romanchuk. “I have a very creative household. I was raised to do what I want with my brain.”
Bringing more colour to the community is something that Communities In Bloom works hard at, and
murals are one big way to do it. Chair of the committee, Jeannine Steinke, said removing graffiti and
adding in murals are two things that go together, and they hope it can remedy tagging that occurs on
different buildings. “We’ve been working on a pilot project for the gravity removal in town. That formed
a conversation about beautifying areas and ways of preventing graffiti, and that’s where murals come in.
From the studies I’ve looked at and the additional research I’ve done, murals are a big deterrent.
Another one is skins on stuff (image wraps) like electrical boxes. There’s less occurrence when you do
that. You don’t usually see murals and art pieces getting tagged because there is that respect for the
artist.” she explained.
Steinke said Wood Buffalo has a program that gets graffiti removal kits into the hands of those whose
property has been tagged. “They have these little citizen kits where if you got tagged, you would call and
tell them that you’ve been tagged with graffiti, show them proof of where you live, and they would give
you a pail that has a scrub brush and the solution and everything else you need in it.”
Communities In Bloom is bringing in some product kits for Whitecourt community members and
business owners to remove graffiti. Once the kits are in, they will advertise and get them to those who
need it. From there, the conversation goes back to murals and how they can help keep tags off town
walls. “At our last meeting, I was like, let’s do this. We have a shed; let’s move forward and show people
that this can be done and done well. It just took off and turned out beautiful,” said Steinke, speaking of
Romanchuk’s artwork. “I’m so happy with how it turned out. It’s beautiful.”
Romanchuk’s connection to the project came through one of her previous commissions. After
Romanchuk completed the mural out front of the Community Lunchbox, Tara Baker, the CLB founder
and chair, who also sits on the Communities In Bloom Society board as a Town Councillor,
recommended the young artist for the Bloom mural.
“She’s got talent. I enjoy working with such a great group of volunteers who want to beautify the
community and who collectively identified that we have some great young local talent artists that we

wanted to showcase and highlight and work with to create some beautiful spaces within our
community,” said Baker.
For Romanchuk, getting to help beautify her community is a pleasure. “It’s an outlet. It lets me get my
mind off things. It’s like a brain break. I do many landscapes on canvas, and I think it would be cool to do
a super huge one with giant rollers, like New York City mural style. It will take a lot of oil paint and a big
wall to do that,” she laughed. A big mountainscape is something she hopes to do next.
“People are attracted to art and want to see it and take pictures with it. It makes it look much more
welcoming. Whenever you’re walking down a main street, you’re going to go to the place with a big
painted storefront to see it. People are drawn to art and love it. I think having it around the community
is great,” added Romanchuk.
Steinke said the mural gives her hope for the future of what Whitecourt would look like with outdoor art
on display. “It doesn’t take much if you have the space and have an artist to do it. One of the other
things we are potentially looking at doing is having a competition or some sort of initiative that would
encourage people to have murals painted on buildings they own or are allowed to use. That would bring
people downtown, specifically, to see that.”
Steinke said there are so many things that could be done with it. “You can make scavenger hunts with
the art. You can do art walks. The town can do so much with this. There are so many good things about
it. Murals can tell stories or pay homage to someone or something. We still have a lot to talk about, but I
would love to see more murals go up, even by the end of this year.”
Any businesses interested in having a mural on one of their walls are encouraged to contact the
Whitecourt Communities In Bloom Society. Those interested in getting their hands on the graffiti
removal kits should follow their Facebook page for updates on when they become available. “We want
to plant that seed and show people that we are out there and doing this. If it’s also going to help keep
our town cleaner, then perfect,” said Steinke.
Those interested in commissioning Ally-Ann for a mural can contact her at ARcommissions@gmail.com.
“She’s amazing. She was easy to work with and kind. She put that design together, and the whole group
was pleased. We hope she has more jobs to do in the future. She is very talented. We are happy that it
all worked out the way it did.”