Chicago murals:
When Alejandro Martell’s employers at ERIS Brewery and Cider House said they wanted a new mural of the Greek goddess Eris on an outside shed, the artist, known as Underseagravy, said it was an assignment he might normally pass to someone who specialized in portraits.
But Eris is the Greek goddess of chaos and destruction, he said, so, “I was totally down for this.”
Martell, who works on ERIS' canning line and occasionally doing business deliveries, spent four days this fall painting the goddess from about the waist up on a storage shed that faces the Irving Park restaurant’s outside dining area. She’s illustrated in black and white in Martell’s usual sketchbook style with lines and hatches. She holds a golden apple and wears a jeweled golden crown and earrings to match. Swirls of purple and black circle behind her, and hints violet flow through her hair.
According to Greek mythology, Eris was not invited to the wedding of Greek hero Peleus and the nymph Thetis, who later became parents to the hero Achilles. As revenge, she dropped the golden Apple of Discord, inscribed with “to the fairest,” among the wedding guests. The resulting fight over who should receive the apple led to the Trojan War.
As for why he took the assignment, Martell, who has lived in Logan Square his entire life, said, “I really wanted the challenge.” He isn’t usually a portrait artist, but then, he’s not really an artist of one thing specifically. Just when he thinks he has his subject style sorted out, it changes, he said.
“I love drawing skulls,” he said, and for a while tried to figure out a skull character that might become his recognizable icon. “I got very good at drawing random skulls,” but nothing stuck.
Then a Belmont Cragin resident asked if he would paint a garage mural, which resulted in a piece featuring the neighbor’s late beloved pit bull riding a motorcycle and wearing the neighbor’s son’s basketball jersey number flanked by Chicago flag stars.
Requests for more animal drawings followed, and he found himself particularly drawn to rats, raccoons and chihuahuas. He painted a black and white wolf by Congress Theater in Logan Square and a bat on the Crawford Steel building in Brighton Park. Rams and other horned creatures started appearing in his work, as well as full skeletons and other anatomical images. He added a pickle character to the compilation wall at ChiPickle in the South Loop.
If artists have one consistent, recognizable character, people know “that’s your stuff. But I do so many different characters than I was doing even a year ago, that people don’t realize it’s all by me,” he said.
What stays consistent are the black line drawings that illustrate the latest figures that he’s focused on. Martell’s work features spray paint and acrylic brush work, black lines and hashes that look like they could have been drawn by a giant with a pencil.
Martell, a Columbia College graduate, has embraced his various artistic periods, even if he hasn’t settled on an iconic image yet for his work. He’ll find one eventually. Or, maybe he won’t. He continues to be down for anything — like a portrait of Eris.