Moorestown High School senior and artist Ryan Casinelli is creating a mural for the First Baptist Community Garden, a piece that will reflect its quiet space.
“I just let the creative juices flow and decided to make what I felt was beautiful for the community,” Casinelli said.
The garden, established three or four years ago, is adjacent to Moorestown’s First Baptist Church on Main Street, and includes benches, picnic tables, plantings and a labyrinth that visitors can trace with their steps. Norma Wright, co-chair of the garden committee, reached out to Casinelli with the idea of creating a mural, and after receiving the go-ahead from the Department of Community Development, work began last summer.
“She really was looking for someone to make a mural, and she knew that I was an artist,” Casinelli said of Wright. “I didn’t even think she knew that I made murals beforehand, but she was kind of going out on a limb and I was really thankful that she reached out.”
When the mural is finished, Wright wants to see how it will fit with the garden’s appeal all year round.
“The colors are going to be bright so that there’s a brightness in all seasons,” she said. “The backdrop, I think, is perfect for the green garden and once things come alive in the spring and throughout the summer, it’ll just compliment it even more.”
Casinelli faced small setbacks when he started prepping the wall, but is happy with how the project has turned out.
“I had to power wash the whole wall, chip all the paint away (and) that took a couple of months, and then I had to find the right paint to put the primer on … he recalled. “But since then, I’ve been able to get it to the right texture and the right color.”
Casinelli and Moorestown High School alumni Sean Allen and Wasiu Ojuolape Jr. created the Bianca Nikol Roberson Memorial Foundation mural in 2021 to honor the late Roberson. Casinelli’s role in bringing something special to the city of Philadelphia inspired him to start creating murals of his own.
“ … It’s one of the main things that encouraged me to make murals in Moorestown because I felt like, if I have the ability to create artwork, I might as well create it to help inspire people and help cultivate the community, and that’s the only thing I want to do at this point,” he noted.
The flowers in the mural will represent flowers of the garden, along with two bees and a dark green background that brings everything to life. There will also be a quote from Dante Alighieri in the top right corner that reads, “Nature is the art of god.”
“You don’t really see murals like it with a dark background and I feel like because of that, it’s going to give a different vibe to something that’s really beautiful,” Casinelli said.
Come its summer completion, Casinelli looks forward to seeing how Moorestown’s residents will interpret the mural and enjoy the peace it offers.
“I hope that people can look at the mural and get their heads out of their phones, stop going on the internet and just enjoy nature and the life God has given us,” he said.
