What's the story behind the 'Gnomes' mural on I-95? We tracked down the artist to ask

EAST GREENWICH — Peering out from behind a purple curtain, the gnomes — and their canine companions — painted on the Shippeetown Road Bridge over Route 95 look positively astonished by the amount of traffic whipping by their hideout.

The mural, between Exits 21 and 24 — formerly Exits 7 and 8 — is one of those things Rhode Islanders see all the time, without much explanation, which sparked the curiosity of one What and Why RI reader. She wrote in to ask if there was any information on the artist behind the mural.

You bet there is.

Who painted the mural?

The mural was done by illustrator and MacArthur Fellow David Macaulay. You may be familiar with his book “The Way Things Work,” a 1988 book where his intricate illustrations simplified the complex, technical way things, well, work. He also wrote the books “Cathedral,” “Pyramid,” “Castle” and “Mosque.”

He was born in England but moved to Cumberland, Rhode Island, in 1962. He loved to draw simple technology, so he went to the Rhode Island School of Design to study architecture. He went on to teach at RISD.

These days he lives in Norwich, Vermont.

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How did Macaulay come to do this mural?

The mural, called “Gnomes,” was finished in October 2013.

It was part of Gov. Lincoln Chafee’s “Gateway Beautification Project” that led to several murals on the state’s main corridors painted by artists with Rhode Island roots. Fidelity Investments, BankRI and The Rhode Island Commodores funded three of the murals.

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The three paid for by the project were: “Windows,” which shows the inside of a mill building, done by Gretchen Dow Simpson and painted on the S-curve in Pawtucket; “Racing Sailboats,” celebrating the return of America’s Cup competition to Rhode Island, done by Anthony Russo and painted on the Wampanoag Trail overpass on Route 195 in East Providence; and Macaulay's “State House,” painted near Saints Sahag and Mesrob Armenian Church on an elbow of Jefferson Street between the Orms and Smith street overpasses, which was meant to pay tribute to the region’s architecture.

“State House” didn’t make it as a mural. Painted in a popular spot for taggers — in the hope that it would deter graffiti artists — the playful mural depicting famous Rhode Islanders as well as invented characters was repeatedly tagged with graffiti. It was painted over in 2017 after it was deemed unfixable.

Luckily, Macaulay donated two other murals to the state around this time, both of which are still here.

There’s “Stone Wall,” which features a playful elf peering out of some faux rocks, painted on the bridge that carries Woodville Road over Route 95 in Hopkinton. It’s meant to be a tribute to the South County landscape.

And then there’s “Gnomes.”

Why gnomes?

The work is an obvious departure from the technical drawings Macaulay is most famous for, so we tracked Macaulay down on Facebook to ask him what his inspiration was for the mural.

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The question was a surprise for him, but a nice one, as it's been long enough that he said he'd "completely forgotten" about the piece. Plus, most people want to talk to him about the mural that was removed. As it turns out, the two are connected.

"One of the first ideas for the Providence mural was a bunch of gnome-like characters peering out from beneath a curtain, or something like. People liked it, but there was some concern that it might be a little distracting — in a bad way," he wrote in a Facebook message. "That curve below the church has to be one of the most heavily trafficked little stretches in the state. So a variation on the gnomes headed south and found a home on a bridge."

"I thought kids in particular might find creatures who live under stones amusing, and that might make the tedium of highway travel a little less so," he said. "As simple as that."

A fun fact is that he's never seen that finished mural.

"Strangely enough, we moved to Vermont, where gnomes actually come from, right after that project was completed," he wrote.

What and Why RI is a weekly feature by The Providence Journal to explore our readers' curiosity. If you have a question about Rhode Island, big or small, email it to klandeck@gannett.com. She loves a good question.

This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: I-95 mural facts: The story of the RI Gnomes mural and others