‘Rad Women’ Honored In GR Artistic Makeover [Video]

An art project throughout downtown will brighten up drab electrical boxes with portraits of 'rad women'.

Now that the weather has improved, you will spot female artists painting on the drab, gray electrical boxes around downtown and up through Heritage Hill. The spring makeover is part of a Downtown GR art initiative to honor 'Rad Women' in our society.

The art project, co-sponsored by the Creston art gallery Lions and Rabbits, is drawing its inspiration from "Rad American Women A-Z," a New York Times bestselling book written by Kate Schatz and illustrated by Miriam Klein Stahl. Schatz will visit Grand Rapids in early May to view the project.

When the portraits, which are being painted by 27 different Grand Rapids female artists, are completed, a walking tour will be set up with GRWalks for residents to view them all in a looped trek from downtown to Heritage Hill and back.

"So you’ll take a walking tour through the city of Grand Rapids and you’ll go: 'A' is for Angela Davis, 'B' is for Billy Jean King;" Lions and Rabbits owner Hannah Berry told FOX 17.

The idea came from DowntownGR's Kimberly VanDriel, "I bought the book for my niece and kind of came up with the idea to do something like this for Women's History Month, in honor of Women's History Month."