What Comes Next Mural

The “What Comes Next” mural was fully designed and executed by nine students in Spring 2025 in the Visual Arts course Special Topics in Mural Painting.  For the first eight weeks of the course, students participated in a rigorous design process lead by associate professor, Vivian Liddell, M.F.A.

After meeting with the Division of Strategic Communications and Marketing to determine design goals and parameters, each student created four initial design sketches in grayscale. The designs were created in proportion to the wall’s dimensions: approximately 4 and a half feet high and 275 feet long.

After a class critique, the grayscale designs were presented and the three top designs were chosen to develop further.

This gives students confidence they can create something on this scale and encourages them to make that leap after graduation.

Vivian Liddell, M.F.A.

Associate Professor, Visual Arts

Each student then created color versions of the top three designs, tweaking the original design as needed to make the designs their own. Students then divided into three groups — one for each design — to present all nine newly revised color versions. After these twenty-seven designs were presented, one design was chosen for execution. graduating senior Emma Jackson’s design was chosen.

Artist-quality synthetic polymer paints were ordered according to their lightfastness rating and suitability for mixing the colors of the chosen design. Students created a grid on the wall using yellow paint and masking tape to scale up the design.

After gridding out the design in yellow, students then spent the rest of the semester mixing accurate colors and painting in the design on the wall. This piece was a fun way to get our students engaged and involved with the applying their developing skills and the Big Bet of Accelerating the Fine Arts and Entertainment.

For more details, check out the UNG Newsroom article, "Students create 'What Comes Next' Mural". 

Participating Artists:

  • Ayla Millar
  • Emma Jackson
  • Ella Whitfield
  • Ruthie Nash
  • Zoe Presten
  • Maria-Paola Russi
  • Chandler Hensley
  • Cathy McLendon
  • Abigail Brown