When it was installed in 2012, Belgian artist ROA’s mural of two sleeping bears was informally dubbed the “69-ing rats” by Rochesterians who saw a lewd act in the imagery and misidentified the animals.
Sometime in the past week, someone sprayed gray paint on the wall, mostly hitting the bears’ faces, claws, and butts.
The mural, “Sleeping Bears,” depicts two dozing North American brown bears painted by the Belgian artist ROA in July of 2012, as part of the inaugural WallTherapy festival. It’s on a windowless side of a building owned by St. Paul Properties LLC, facing the parking lot of World Wide News.
ROA’s style is stark. After blocking out the general shape of the animals with white and black paint, he puts in the fine details of fur, claws, teeth, and other anatomy with heavy black lines of spray paint.
“He is deeply rooted in animal activism, which is one of the reasons we wanted to work with him,” said WallTherapy Lead Curator Erich Lehman.
ROA has spent more than a decade traveling the world, painting illustrative images of animals, mostly native to the places he paints them, which in some way interact with the urban terrain.
In the case of the sleeping pile of bears, the bottom bear appears to be resting its head on a security gate, while the top bear is oriented the other way, resting its chin on the bottom bear’s knees.
Before ROA was even finished with the piece, people began voicing their ire about the painting. Some folks, apparently unfamiliar with bear’s anatomy, insisted that the long-snouted animals were rats. Others saw something lewd in the positioning of their bodies, and before long the mural was being referred to as the “69-ing rats” online and in conversation. Some just didn’t like the work aesthetically, and even called for it to be painted over.
At the time, a local artist who lived across the street in the Warner Lofts with a window facing the mural, said he hadn’t opened his shades since the bears were painted.
“The mural was intended to bring a spot of warmth and fuzziness, and nature and outdoors to central downtown,” Lehman said. “But it was met with a lot of confusion and at times anger, because the animals were mistaken for rats, even though they do not have giant segmented tails that rats have.”
And the perceived sexual nature of the mural sealed its fate as an “eyesore” and “indecent.”
“This was the first real introduction of murals of this scale into Rochester,” Lehman says. “So there were just a lot of misconceptions as people just weren’t used to this or ready for it at the time. This confusion about what it was led to a lot of rancor and venom that were, in my opinion, really undeserved for a big mural about two soft, cuddly bears sleeping.”
But, Lehman adds, art is subjective, and oftentimes people just see what they want to see.
“And there was no changing their minds,” he says. “But the amount of conversations and dialogue that we were having with people who wouldn’t normally talk together — you know, that’s totally worth the price of admission.”
Nearly 10 years old, the weathered mural already had areas of peeling and chipped paint, revealing the off-white wall beneath the layers. Now, those Rochesterians who called for the mural to be removed might get what they wanted.
CITY reached out to ROA for comment, but did not immediately hear back. But WallTherapy founder Ian Wilson says that the artist is well-accustomed to the transient nature of street art.
“Knowing ROA, I doubt the vandalism of his piece would elicit any measurable emotional response,” Wilson says.
“He makes art for the moment, and perhaps the moment has, unfortunately, passed for this specific piece,” Lehman said.
But as word spread about the defacement, fans of the mural expressed regret online that it’s ruined.
“It’s super unfortunate because we felt that mural still had some life in it,” Lehman says. “But, you know, as we’ve tried to tell folks from the beginning, art in the public is ephemeral. And sometimes it does just have a finite life.”
Lehman says that WallTherapy organizers plan to invite ROA to create a new mural in the future, but at the moment are uncertain what they’ll do with the defaced painting.
“Because it’s so fresh, there’s no immediate solution for what will happen to it, but we’ll figure it out,” he says. “I mean, our goal is always to beautify and inspire Rochester. So as sad as we are, it’s an opportunity to update and refresh and bring something new, whatever it’s going to be.”
Rebecca Rafferty is CITY’s life editor. She can be reached at rrafferty@rochester-citynews.com.