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Travel

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 13 , 2022. SECTION F EZ EE

GO HERE, NOT THERE

Why you should

consider Mobile, Ala.,

for Mardi Gras instead

of New Orleans. F5

The coronavirus pandemic has disrupted travel domestically and around the world. You will find the latest developments at washingtonpost.com/coronavirus/

BY ANDREA SACHS

Shepard Fairey left C harleston, S.C., after

high school, but the artist still pops up in

his hometown, even when he’s t housands of

miles away. He appears at College Lodge, a

dormitory at the College of Charleston.

Outside Groucho’s Deli, a corner sandwich

shop. And across from the Daily, a coffee-

house that sells honey lavender lattes and

feta toast.

“Three murals are still up — two on King,

one on Calhoun,” Shepard said of the public

artworks he created for a 2014 show at the

College of Charleston’s Halsey Institute of

Contemporary Art, six years after he de-

signed the campaign-defining “Hope” post-

er of Barack Obama. “There still aren’t a t on

of murals in Charleston because of the

historical preservation, but I think the

appreciation for street art is growing.”

In Charleston, a city known for its regal

architecture and staid statues, his compar-

atively audacious pieces make some disso-

nant noise. As a kid, Shepard favored punk

rock and skateboarding over the more

genteel pastimes of the South. He and his

friends would skate in an abandoned pool

in Ansonborough, a neighborhood that

predates the Revolutionary War. “It was

like a teenage playground wasteland,” he

said. “You could paint graffiti on the walls

of the pool and no one cared.”

The city demolished the pool in the

1990 s. By this time, Shepard had departed

Charleston to study art at the Rhode Island

School of Design in Providence. The year he

returned to paint the murals for the Halsey

show, lawmakers banned skateboarding on

busy downtown sidewalks and streets,

including King and Calhoun. Three years

later, Charleston County Park & Recreation

Commission opened the $4.8 million SK8

Charleston on a wedge of land between

Interstate 26 and the Ashley River. Shepa-

rd, who lives and works in Southern

California, the birthplace of skateboarding,

describes the skate park as one of the best

in the South. “A nybody going to Charleston

who is like I was as a teen now has a great

legal spot for skateboarding,” he said.

Shepard returns to Charleston several

times a year to visit his parents, who still

reside there. During these trips, he has

noticed how much Charleston is evolving,

as are his perceptions of the city he once

rebelled against. “Charleston’s history is

fused into everything, but the way it’s

mutating with contemporary influences is

really fascinating,” he said. “I can look at

what’s great from the past and is worth

SEE CHARLESTON ON F6

In stately Charleston, a splash of color

Change is coursing through the S.C. city. Just ask Shepard Fairey, whose murals embody its less traditional side.

ISTOCK

GAVIN MCINTYRE FOR THE WASHINGTON POST

HALSEY INSTITUTE OF CONTEMPORARY ART

FROM TOP: Charleston, S.C., is known

for its regal architecture; Dyani White

Hawk’s “Hear Her” exhibition is on

display at the Halsey Institute of

Contemporary Art until Feb. 26; Shepard

Fairey has painted a number of murals

in his hometown, including one near the

Daily coffeehouse on King Street.

BY LARRY BLEIBERG

Walking through the Atlanta
airport, I hear a powerful voice
calling out over the bustle.
“The world is waiting for you,”
it proclaims.
The passengers surrounding
me continue their march past
Burger King and toward security.
But I stop and turn, searching for
the source. “The world would like
you to find a way, to get in the
way,” it continues with a preach-
er’s cadence, “to get into what I

call good trouble, necessary trou-

ble.”

Not your typical preflight an-

nouncement, but the messenger

isn’t an airport employee, either.

I round the corner to find John

Lewis calling to me from a video

monitor. Surrounding him in the

domestic terminal atrium are dis-

play cases holding artifacts and

mementos that document his ex-

traordinary life. Lewis was a one-

time Freedom Rider who led

lunch-counter sit-ins, suffered a

fractured skull after an attack

during a civil rights march near

Selma, Ala., and served 17 terms

in Washington as a Democratic

representative for Georgia’s 5th

District, which includes most of

Atlanta.

The exhibit complements a de-

parture gate display devoted to

the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.,

which includes objects such as

the transistor radio he carried to

marches to monitor news cover-

age.

And near the airport train, an

extensive walkway exhibit shows

how Atlanta’s Black community

fought segregation.

Ta ken together, the exhibits at

Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta Inter-

national, one of the world’s busi-

est airports, offer visitors an un-

expected dive into civil rights

history.

For passengers, it’s certainly a

more rewarding way to spend a

layover than lining up for an

overpriced sandwich. And al-

though airport officials like to say

that ATL sees more people in a

month than Paris’s Louvre wel-

comes in a year, there never

seems to be a crowd at the exhib-

its.

Although it may seem surpris-

ing to find artifacts at an airport,

Benjamin Austin, Hartsfield-

Jackson’s senior art program

manager, says these transporta-

tion hubs are “the most public,

diverse and democratic settings

available.”

“There are many people in the

world who do not have the oppor-

tunity or inclination to visit insti-

SEE ATLANTA ON F5

At Atlanta airport, transportive civil rights exhibits