The Killoran Performing Arts Centre bandshell, located at East Side Park in Morris, has a brand new look.
Thanks to members of the local rock band Interrobang and community volunteers, the bandshell has been cleaned and received a fresh coat of paint.
Band member Erik Stoeckeler said that the idea originated from Open Mic Night. Open Mic Night in Morris, which occurs on the last Saturday of every month at Angell Dance Arts Studio, began earlier this year, started by community member Jeff Hayes.
As more Open Mic Nights came and went, Hayes, Stoeckeler, and other regular participants started playing music together and eventually formed Interrobang.
The band includes Hayes and Stoeckeler, along with Riley Kaiser and John Kriegel Thielen.
Eventually, the group played in the band shell and recorded the performance. While watching the video back, the group noticed that the warm lights shining down on the stage made some of the dust on the bandshell glow, almost looking like gold, Stoeckeler said.
“Then I thought, dudes, what if we painted that gold?” Stoeckeler said.
Stoeckeler asked Hayes, a graphic artist, to create a rendering of what the band shell would look like with some of those triangles painted gold.
With the picture in hand, the group went to a meeting of the Morris Park Board to propose the idea.
Different ideas for paint were given at the park board meeting, so Hayes created more renderings. Eventually, the Park Board gave its support for the original idea with the gold paint. From there, the group needed final approval from the Morris City Council, which they received on Oct. 14.
When the council asked about the timeline for the project, Stoeckeler said it depended on money and help. Some meeting attendees donated to the cause right there at the council meeting.
After the city council gave approval, Stoeckeler took to social media to get input from the community. “I’m not sure I planned it that way, but I’m glad it worked out that way,” he said. “Because, even if I wanted it gold, I would actually want it white if the whole community wanted it white, because that’s how democracy should work, and that’s what democracy is about, like, wanting the most people happy, right?”
Having donations in hand was great, Stoeckeler said, but he added that he felt a little strange having money in hand before having the project priced out and materials acquired. This prompted him to create the Morris Unity Fund, a spreadsheet to keep track of all the donations and all of the expenses, including photos and receipts.
Stoeckeler also added images of projects that the group had already done, including helping to repair the roof on Angell Dance Arts Studio.
Before the painting could start, the band shell had to be cleaned and prepped. The band, along with volunteers from the community, stepped up to get the band shell spick and span. There were even young kids who joined the effort.
After the cleaning and before the painting, the band shell needed to be taped. This was almost more difficult than the actual painting, Stoeckeler said, which was made more challenging with high winds that day.
After that, the painting began. “There’s no way we could have done what we did without this group of guys showing up,” Stoeckeler said. A group of volunteers, who no one in the band had ever met, showed up to help. “They worked and worked and worked and worked and worked for hours,” he said.
During the day, Stoeckeler said he ordered pizza for food. The group was there from about 10 in the morning to eight at night. Joe Alia, who lives across the street from the park, saw the group working all day and brought Pad Thai that his wife had made to share with the group.
County Line Equipment in Cyrus donated the use of a lift for the project, and while Stoeckeler was there, he noticed a man using a paint sprayer. Stoeckeler asked him if he would be interested in helping with the project, and though the man wasn’t available to help, he did offer the use of his sprayer free of charge.
The project couldn’t be completed in one weekend due to running out of paint, so the group planned to finish the following weekend. As cooler weather started creeping in, Stoeckeler said that Larry Nelson has donated the use of a butane heater to keep the space warm enough for the paint.
The group hopes that the work will have been completed last weekend, but worst-case scenario, Stoeckeler said, is that they’ll have to take all of the tape down and wait until spring to retape and finish the job.
