ITEM PHOTO BY MATT DEMIRS
Georgia Hill works on her mural on 79-87 Munroe St., spelling out the words: “Not long now.”
By MATT DEMIRS
LYNN — Her designs are black and white, but far from basic.
Australian-born muralist, Georgia Hill, 29, explained her perceptual phenomenon, synesthesia, to visitors Saturday night at the Beyond Walls artist talk at Lynn Historical Museum, giving the audience a lens to the layers of her work.
Synesthesia is a condition that happens when a sense, such as sight, triggers another sense, like smell, at the same time. In Hill’s case, when she sees letters, numbers, and words, they appear in color.
The sensory overload has led her to love the color of certain words like September, but hate the colors that make up the word anesthesia.
It’s become almost like a tick, she said, when it comes to certain things, such as when she receives a new phone number.
“I’ve had lots of phone numbers where I’ve had to tell the guy to change it because I was like ‘this phone number is yellow and purple and it’s the ugliest thing I’ve ever seen,” she said, jokingly. “I would say please just give me a black and white and yellow phone number, please.”
It would make sense why Hill chooses to paint in black and white, but the artist said it was a preference she made long before discovering what synesthesia was.
“That wasn’t why I was working in black and white, but it made my work make a lot more sense to me,” she said. “It made me more comfortable and allowed me to work faster and clearer because it took away this distracting layer.”
Still, Hill says the way she sees things doesn’t change who she is as an artist, which is something people don’t always get.
“It’s just a thing my brain does,” she said. “And I kind of know that it’s how my brain thinks.”
Al Wilson, director and founder of Beyond Walls, said Hill’s request for paint supplies was by far the easiest to fill.
Large letters hug the walls of 79-87 Munroe St., spelling out the words: “Not long now.”
The message which is simple to read, Hill said, allows people to develop their own meaning for the phrase and how it fits into their own life.
“I try to make it open ended so it can mean something to everyone,” she said. “It really is about what you bring to it yourself.”
It provokes thought and emotion for people who might be going through something personal and even facilitates discussion between others, a theory Hill calls “spaces speaking to people.”
Which is exactly what art is supposed to do, Hill said.
“I let people come up with their own meaning. I feel like that is what art should do. It shouldn’t tell you how to feel or how to think of a certain situation,” she said. “It allows you to put your own experiences in perspective.”
She has already seen how these murals are speaking to people and leaving an impact for those watching the street art unfold.
A testament to that has been the support the community and the pride people have shown for their city as they thank the artists for their work throughout the downtown, she said.
“That is why I enjoy what I do,” she said. “Coming to places like here allows me to connect with people who feel connected to each other.”
Matt Demirs can be reached at [email protected].
