BRUNSWICK, Ga. – An artist originally from Brunswick, who currently lives in Miami, returned to his hometown to bring the community together.
“This is the area that we want to revive and bring back and this is the area to tell the story,” said Marvin Weeks.
Weeks is painting a mural of Ahmaud Arbery on the old Wigfall building on Albany Street, which is about 9 miles from the Satilla Shores neighborhood where Arbery was shot and killed on Feb. 23.
“This is a focal point where we can all come together and dissimilate what is happening and taking place and move forward,” Weeks told News4Jax.
Weeks said this gives the community a link to currently what happened yesterday, today and tomorrow.
“Even though the story is very pertinent to what is happening, but the history of this community is very long and vast and I think that history fits into the history of this community,” he said.
Arbery’s mural is on the side of the building, which will soon be the site of the Brunswick African American Cultural Center. It’s set to open at the end of summer.
The center’s director, Aundra Fuller, is calling the situation a humanitarian issue, not a race issue.
Fuller said she hopes the portrait of Arbery on her building will represent what Brunswick is really about.
“To have it on our building, we’re just glad to be a part of Brunswick‘s coming together. We think that this is going to make our community better and we want to be a part of that connectivity that represents to the country what Brunswick really represents,” Fuller said.
Weeks said Arbery's father and uncle have visited the mural.
“He [Arbery’s father] was very proud of the process and he wanted to be a part of it and continue,” Weeks said.