A three-story mural permanently installed Tuesday morning in the new Sawyer Free Library’s main stairwell pays homage to the other thing Cape Ann is known for besides its historic fishing industry: stark and striking granite quarries.
“Cape Ann Quarries” was created by acclaimed local photographer, artist and historian Leslie Bartlett, who attended the installation.
The photographic mural donated by Bartlett spans all three stories of the stairwell. It was installed by a crew from Sgi Graphics Installation Corp. of Bedford after it was printed on vinyl by Bluebird Graphic Solutions in Woburn.
The mural starts on the ground floor of the stairwell and features the varied and textured rock wall of a Rockport quarry. It ascends to a view of a granite face with ferns growing diagonally along a crack in the stone.
The top floor gives one a glimpse of tree tops and sky. The mural makes one feel as if you’re walking up through a quarry while ascending the stairs.
Bartlett has trained his lens on Cape Ann’s quarries and the stories of those who worked them for nearly two decades.
A lifetime member of the Sandy Bay Historical Society, he’s a native of Epsom, New Hampshire, who has lived on Cape Ann for 50 years. He now lives in Manchester-by-the-Sea.
Bartlett’s photography was featured in a major solo exhibition at the Cape Ann Museum from 2007 to 2008 that captured the haunting textures and human history of the region’s granite industry, the library said.
His photographic research looks at the cultural and physical legacy of stone workers throughout New England. It forms the foundation of his upcoming book, “BREAK Stone, Water, Heart: The Culture of Cape Ann Granite,” the library said.
In 2015, Bartlett unveiled EKKLESIA, a monumental 9-by-30-foot installation drawn from a Rockport quarry wall. The installation has traveled to multiple venues across the region. EKKLESIA serves as the base of the library’s installation on the ground floor.
Bartlett took the photos for the mural on the second and third floors this past spring. EKKLESIA is a much older image, dating back 15 years, he said. It was taken 40 feet below the surface.
Bartlett said it challenges the notion of Gloucester fishermen and the sailing ship. But there is a connection to the sea. With the image, Bartlett became interested in the moment when sailors would disembark from their ships and kiss the ground.
“It’s not a picture of men working in a quarry,” he said. “It’s not a picture of tools. It’s an image that demands that you stand so that it can see you,” he said. The base of EKKLESIA contains a line of water at the bottom of the quarry.
Library trustee Simon Paddock had the idea to have Bartlett create a mural at Sawyer Free Library.
During the library project’s original design phase, architects identified the stairwell as a wonderful place for a graphic of some sort, Paddock said. They also were interested in the concept of biophilia, looking to bring nature into the building.
“Once that idea was introduced by the architects, we thought ‘Oh, Leslie Bartlett has these fabulous photographs of quarry walls and wouldn’t it be great to have the experience of a quarry in the building,’” Paddock said.
“This has been a vision for two or three years,” Library Director Jenny Benedict said. “I wanted part of the library to really reflect our local Gloucester community and part of that was to bring the sense of Gloucester as a place into our library, and what better way to do it than these gorgeous, full murals of the quarries.”
A ribbon cutting for the completion of the Sawyer Free Library renovation project is scheduled for 3 p.m. Friday, Sept. 5, and a Community Celebration and Open House will be held 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 6. Both events at the library, 2 Dale Ave., are free to the public.
On Sept. 6, Bartlett will give a talk, “Stone Wave: A Commentary on the Making of the Library’s Mural Installation ‘Cape Ann Quarries,’” during the Open House in the Community Room on the ground floor, which happens to be adjacent to the mural, from 10:30 to 11:30 a.m.
The event is not only a look at the making of the mural, but a reflection on how art, place, and community intersect in space that belongs to everyone, library officials said.
Ethan Forman may be contacted at 978-675-2714, or at eforman@northofboston.com.