LYNN — The assignment was to draw a label for a beer can that evoked images of a harvest.
The name of the beer brewed by Bent Water in Lynn is “Harvester American Brown Ale,” after all, and it was Michael Aghahowa got the gig to come up with the label. The Lynn native and Lynn Tech graduate began thinking about what the word “harvest” meant to him.
“I thought of what the word ‘harvester’ meant,” said the 25-year-old Aghahowa. “It’s the collection of crops. It makes me think of crops, of living off the land, of appreciating nature at its finest.”
And that certainly fits Aghahowa’s nature, so to speak.
“I go walking through Lynn Woods a lot with my friend and her dog during the height of fall, and we’ve really come to appreciate the beauty of nature, seeing all the different colors of the leaves.”
The friend is Allison Miller, one of the artists at RAW (Raw Art Works) in Lynn — an organization central to Aghahowa’s life. In fact, the Bent Water approached RAW with the idea of the group’s taking part in the branding of its new beer– with a portion of the profits from the new brew going back to RAW. Aghahowa, an alumnus of RAW, was asked if he could take part, and he jumped at the chance.
“It (the label) came together quickly,” said Aghahowa. “I collected a lot of leaves and made a collage out of them. I’ve always liked collages. I also wanted to use actual colors. So that’s how I created this label, to use Harvester in its own way.”
Aghahowa’s family has been in Lynn for three generations. He can’t really call any part of the city “home” because he moved (always within the city) at least a half-dozen times, but says he never saw that as a hindrance.
“It was always just me and my mom growing up,” he said. “I never really had my dad in my life at all. But as long as my mom and I were together it was fine. I actually thought it was kind of exciting. I got to meet and to know a lot of people.”
He did wish for some more company, however,
“I used to ask my mom for a brother or a sister,” he said. Even today, Aghahowa said one of his greatest wishes is not only to be a dad, “but to be a good dad.”
His association with RAW began before he even got into middle school.
“My friend’s older brother was in RAW,” he said. “Every year, RAW had a block party, and I went. Even at a young age, I liked to draw and wanted to be an artist.”
When he got into middle school, a RAW representative came to KIPP, where he was attending school, and he subsequently applied. And he stayed through high school.
“RAW is a cool place,” Aghahowa said. “It’s totally judgment-free zone.”
And that’s important, he said, because Lynn “can be a troubled place, especially if you live in certain areas and depending on who you hang around with.
“(RAW) is a place where, when you leave — when you inevitably have to leave — you’re leaving with a voice,” he said. “You can speak for yourself, and for what you believe.
“RAW helped me ignite that voice, not just my real voice, but my artistic voice as well.”
Aghahowa, who graduated from the Montserrat School of Art in Beverly, says his favorite type of drawing is portrait-painting.
“I really like to draw people,” he said. “I can draw anything, but I enjoy people. Every single one of us is different.
