Steve Bagwell, a former student at South Junior High School, rests in front of the mural he helped create in 1999 at the school. All 115 of the student-made murals will be lost when the school is torn down in June.

When Steve Bagwell was a student at South Junior High School in the late 1990s, he began to treat the distinctive murals that filled the halls as a kind of global positioning system.

“The school is round and doesn’t have any windows,” Bagwell says. “The murals are like landmarks for orienting yourself in the building because you can’t really tell where you are sometimes. Like, you knew band class is by the Elvis Presley stamp mural.”

Unfortunately, Elvis has left the building – or at least he will permanently on Friday.

All South faculty must be out by that date so that asbestos removal can begin on the soon-to-be razed structure. The new school will purportedly be ready by August, but the unique, student-generated murals will not survive the process.

Until this week, the vivid artwork had adorned the interiors of South Junior High School, 2734 La., since the late 1980s. The work was created by ninth-graders in each year’s advanced art class.

Some of the pieces are interpretations of paintings by masters Salvador Dali, Vincent van Gogh and Grant Wood.

Some celebrate performers such as Louis Armstrong and Audrey Hepburn.

A few capture cartoon figures a la Bart Simpson and Calvin and Hobbes.

Others are tributes to fast food restaurants.

Bagwell’s contribution, titled “Pink Staircase,” is somewhat obscure compared to the pop iconography of the majority of murals.

“It’s an unknown artist. I don’t even remember his name,” he says. “It’s a view from high up looking at a sunset from a beach. There’s a highway with a bridge over it coming to a path from the bridge up to a staircase toward the viewer.”

The piece was striking enough to earn it second place when South students collectively voted this year on their favorite mural.

Bagwell says, “I didn’t remember it being that good. I went and saw it (last week) and the colors are really cool. It really sticks out. The perspective of it is very weird.”

Eye of the beholder

Lynn Harrod, assistant principal of South, takes a break to circle the hallways of the school and peruse the fated murals.

“I almost take them for granted because I walk by them all the time,” Harrod says. “When an outsider comes in here, they marvel at it. Those of us on a day-to-day basis don’t take time to stop and go, ‘Wow.’ We do the wow when we’re watching them paint them.”

An 11-year veteran of the school, Harrod is well-versed in the large pieces that embellish the halls (and some classrooms) – he’s seen many of them from conception to finish.

“It’s such a vast difference of art. There’s an (M.C.) Escher one I really like,” he says. “But as in most art, it’s all in the eye of the beholder.”

As Harrod stops to look at a cartoonish piece that blends the South Cougar’s mascot into interacting with a real drinking fountain, he also mentions an element that is noticeably lacking on South’s walls.

“We don’t have graffiti,” he says.

“Graffiti is unheard of. You talk to schools, and that’s usually an issue. I honestly can tell you in the 11 years I’ve been here, I can count on one hand – and probably just a couple fingers – the amount of graffiti we’ve had. That’s because kids respect what other students have done.”

New tradition

This school year marked the first time in two decades ninth-graders were not given the opportunity to paint new murals. The decision was met with understandable disappointment.

As for current and former students who learned that their artwork would be disappearing, Harrod says the reactions are varied.

“Anywhere from ambivalence to anxiety. For most of them it’s anxiety,” he describes.

Bagwell admits he was certainly saddened by the prospect.

“It took half the semester, like a month and a half or two to create,” he recalls.

The 24-year-old graduated from Kansas University with an architecture degree and now works at a downtown architecture office. He says the artistic know-how learned at South is still part of his day-to-day duties, and he enjoys crafting pencil drawings in his spare time.

“I just wanted to make sure that I or some other person will have them all photographed so there’s a way to remember them.”

Fortunately, a poster is being released by the school that will honor all 115 pieces.

Administrators also hope to start a fresh tradition on the pristine walls of the next school.

“We’ve just got to figure out how it will work in the new facility,” Harrod says. “I can’t see us not doing it.”