Art Installation Lights Up Philly Street

A display of street art is lighting up a Philadelphia street known for being a haven for dodgy activity. Percy Street, located in South Philadelphia, is an anomaly on the city’s grid pattern. Shaped like the letter “J,” it curves between South 9th Street and Reed Street. For mural artist David Guinn, it was the perfect location for a little brightening-up. He described to Hyperallergic.com how the neighborhood around Percy Street was busy, but the street itself was secluded, making it the ideal location for drug dealing, littering, and all other sorts of illegal activities.

The “Electric Street” art installation is shown at nighttime here.

Guinn collaborated with lighting designer Drew Billiau to create an illuminated art illustration that would lighten up Percy Street both literally and figuratively. The two came up with “Electric Street,” an LED display that looks like a panel of multicolored Wonderland among the dinginess of its surroundings. The display “covers a section of wall with dynamic geometric shapes that at night are lit with LED arcs that change colors on a 10-minute program.”

Guinn said that something like Electric Street had always been a dream of his, the type of project where “you could treat a large space in the same intuitive manner that you might paint in a studio.” This wasn’t Guinn’s first art project in Philadelphia: he has created several large murals for the city in other locations. Then he received a grant from the Knight Foundation for a public art project. His first plan for a Center City mural fell through, and then he started talking to people in the South Philly neighborhood where he lives. The mentioned Percy Street, and how it had been a problem for a long time. The PPD says that there have been “five aggravated assaults, two burglaries, 10 robberies, and 52 thefts within a two-block radius of Percy Street in the past six months.” Guinn’s plan was to shine a literal light on the neighborhood.

Electric Street was inaugurated with a block party in August.