LANSING, Mich. (WLNS) — Work is now being done to restore the George Floyd mural that was vandalized in Lansing. Floyd’s death sparked protests for racial justice nationwide after he was killed by a police officer.
The mural can be found under I-496 on the Lansing River Trail. This is where Isiah Lattimore spray-painted his original mural. He said he is back with more inspiration to redo the piece.
“I wasn’t surprised,” Lattimore said after he found our his work was vandalized. “I wasn’t happy about it.”
Around the same time Isiah found out, people were flooding him with messages to help fix what was done.
Lattimore said, “I think that really kind of nerfed any animosity I would have felt.”
“People are still pretty passionate about it,” he said. “So that’s good, right? Like if it got defaced then no one cared, that would be a lot more depressing I think. So at least they wanted me to come back.”
He said this is a two day project, “I would say three to four hours of doing the grid and then it’ll probably take me eight to 10 to paint it.”
Lattimore was able to take off work and buy the supplies he needed thanks to the community donating around $8,000.
“So, I wanted to do maybe a silhouette of protesters on the side and again that alludes to that fact of like, at least the restoration of this was really everyone coming together. Maybe that’s cheesy, I don’t know.”
“I could just offer my art,” Lattimore said. “So to feel like I was successful in doing that to help Black Lives Matter or at least draw attention to this instance, I don’t know, makes me feel a little less useless I guess.”
