For many, a career in the arts is seen as simple freelance work, something that is more of a hobby than anything else. To Francisco Loyola, it started as such, but turned into a yearly recurrence in the city of Kenosha. Since the beginning of his journey, he has been in charge of many murals and statement pieces that are scattered around the Kenosha area. It began during 2020, when an uprising occurred, causing many buildings to be boarded up for protection or in worse cases, show that they had shut down at the time. 

“We were located right here in the center of the action,...but everything looked really, really sad, so someone started painting a mural in one of those panels,” Loyola recalled. “I invited another of my friends, Conrad Hermann; we just assigned that we would help to paint some murals. From there, it went crazy because we lost count of how many murals were painted all over Kenoahs, and they were changing and changing all the time.” These murals laid the foundation for the current acceptance they currently have and even led to a local artist making donations to the city which led to a mural being painted as a gift to the city. 

A bit later, in 2023, a former executive director of Kenosha-and currently Lake Geneva- invited Loyola to organize a mural project in that area. With the success of the original goal of seven murals completed and three extra done that day, Loyola stated “With that project, I contacted the mayor, at that time she was just recently elected, and proposed that we do it right here;she gave us a little bit of money to get it started,and the city has been supporting the project for the last year.” 

For many events such as these, issues are common, the logistics and funding for the murals were hard for Loyola and the many artworks such as the sculpture work that he does along Lake Michigan. The sculptures were easier to get funding due to the solid information that the people were given on them, but murals and other paintings are not so easy to inform about the price and time that will be needed to complete them. 

For many of these projects, artistic direction is a priority; while it has caused some confusion in the details of the artworks, it had enough guidelines and simplicity to be enjoyed by many. “What I think it does is having the murals say to the rest of the community that we are open to supporting the arts. In some way, it reflects a more open and accepting community” Loyola explains. 

Loyola is currently expecting to create new sculptures around the lake this year. Currently their support is growing, but not enough funds have been raised in order for them to be created. He hopes that these new murals and sculptures will gain the money needed to continue creating these works of art.