EAST VILLAGE — A new mural honoring women’s right to vote will go up on an Avenue C wall where a politically charged painting was controversially covered last year.
The wall, at the corner of East Sixth Street, has hosted various murals through the years, until a piece paying tribute to President Obama was painted over by building tenant RCN cable last year.
Now, the cable company is sponsoring the Lower Eastside Girls Club to produce a new large-scale painting for the block that will depict the history of the suffragette movement through the eyes of contemporary female artists.
“The message is, ‘They fought to get us the vote — it’s up to us to use it,’” said Lyn Pentecost, founder of the LES Girls Club, who was approached by RCN about doing the piece.
The cable company erased the two-year-old Obama mural, painted by celebrated local artist Antonio “Chico” Garcia, because officials said it was put up without permission.
The wall has hosted a series of works over the years, including other murals that the Girls Club collaborated on.
The nonprofit organization Voto Latino, founded by actress and Girls Club supporter Rosario Dawson, is partnering with the club on the project, and it is expected to go up sometime in mid-September, Pentecost and RCN staff said.
“This will be the launch of a voter-registration campaign aimed at women 18 to 25 years old and a civics curriculum for high school girls,” Pentecost added.
She noted that some of the artists who painted the construction walls outside of the Girls Club’s forthcoming new headquarters on Avenue D will contribute to the project.
