96 PUNCHMAGAZINE.COM INK DWELL’S DYNAMIC DUO DRAWS NATURE INTO URBAN PLACES words by JOHANNA HARLOW A Godzilla-sized monarch has come to roost on a Tenderloin apartment building. Hyde Street’s largest resident flexes its multi-story, sunshine-colored wings, an unapologetic contrast to the gritty neutral tones of the urban landscape. After all, this is its home too. “When we made cities, we made them with the intention to not have nature in them and to block it out, but nature has come back in. It’s unavoidable!” notes Jane Kim, the muralist behind Ink Dwell, a Half Moon Baybased art studio. “So how are we going to live with it? ... I’m hoping our work can provide a reconnection to a different perspective of how we can engage with nature.” Le Papillon is part of Jane’s Migrating Mural campaign series, which spotlights the threatened monarch along the migration corridors these butterflies share with humans. It’s one of many monumental projects. Jane and her paintbrush have sent seagulls and terns pinwheeling around the Jones Beach Energy and Nature Center in New York and jellyfish pulsing along the walls of National Aquarium in Maryland. Countless more of her painted creatures (furry, feathered and finned) inhabit buildings and walls across the country. Combining fine art with scientific illustration, Jane’s birds and butterflies are never just a pretty pair of wings. “It’s certainly not typical … There’s a fidelity to accuracy while still a real deep embrace of creativity and inspiration,” describes Thayer Walker, Jane’s husband. When Thayer isn’t putting fingers to keyboard as an author and correspondent on the topics of exploration and the natural world, he oversees operations at Ink Dwell. Together, this dedicated duo brings contemplative beauty to the conservation conversation. Imagination Gone Wild PHOTOGRAPHY: COURTESY OF INK DWELL
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