Miniblind mural: art from the heart

The artist wants to auction the mural and give the proceeds to charity.
BOARDMAN -- Sept. 11, 2001, led a Boardman man to a project that changed his life and won him accolades.
Stephen Sullivan III, who owns Sullivan's Wallpapering, said he watched in disbelief as the first plane flew into the first tower at the World Trade Center and then the second.
He said he wanted to do something for his country, something patriotic, but he hadn't figured out just what that would be.
Then a year-and-a-half later he saw a mural of the New York skyline pre-9/11 with the towers rising high above everything else.
Sullivan thought he would do what he knows -- he would put the mural on blinds.
He knew that a Twin Towers miniblind mural would have to be perfect, because, after all, it was one of the most photographed places in the world. People would know if a measurement was off.
Sullivan, one of only 800 in the country to be invited into the National Guild of Professional Paperhangers, had decided that when he completed the miniblind mural he would submit it as an entry into the annual competition.
Getting started
When he started working on project, he said there was an eeriness about the process.
"I had to start from the middle and work out and up. I had to build the towers back up before doing any of the other buildings," he said.
But he said he felt a spiritual connection to those who died in New York City on 9/11 while putting the photomural together.
"I was slowly getting to the point where the planes actually hit. I had to walk away from the mural loads of times. Sometimes I could only do a couple of strips at time before I had to walk away," he said.
He said he could see flashes of people, "God forbid that I should see someone standing in a window or something -- it would just be too much."
Planning the project
Sullivan said a great deal of planning went into the project. He pored over mathematical formulas and practiced on other wallpaper first to ensure that when he cut the photomural and pasted it onto the slats that the alignment would be perfect.
Finally, he said, he arrived at a measurement that got him within a minuscule 2/1000th of an inch, allowing him to keep all elements of the photomural together.
Another challenge for Sullivan was pasting the strips onto the miniblinds. The timing of the paste was critical to the success of the project. If it wasn't on long enough, it would not adhere properly to the surface. If left on too long, the strip would expand, ruining the project.
He completed the 12-by-8 miniblind photomural he titled "Twin Souls" just in time to enter it into the specialty category of National Guild of Professional Paperhangers competition in Orlando, Fla.
He wowed his peers at the conference, and four prominent paperhangers from New York City told him that he "hit a home run" with his work, which took 250 hours to complete.
Still, Sullivan, wasn't totally convinced that he would win the top prize.
"I was on the edge of my chair as I listened to the announcements of the second and third place winners in the category. Then they announced that I had won -- I received a standing ovation," he said.
Sullivan won first place, but there was something else he had in mind to do with the eight-panel miniblind.
Sullivan wants to have the miniblind auctioned at Sotheby's in New York City, one of the most prominent auction houses in the world, with proceeds going to a yet unnamed charity to benefit children. He said Sotheby's has the request under consideration.
"I have videotaped the photomural to send it to former New York City Mayor Rudy Gulliani to ask him for assistance he could lend in getting it auctioned."
He said he gave a book with photos of the miniblinds to Youngstown Mayor George McKelvey to show President Bush when he was campaigning in the Youngstown area.
He and his wife, Angela, a native of Wales, have four boys, 17-year-old Tom, 15-year-old Steve, 7-year-old Alex and 5-year-old Sean.
Sullivan received his first-place award Sept. 11, 2004.