Photo credit Logan Westom/Courtesy of FRO
The Manette Free Wall is never quite the same place twice. Paint goes up, another artist responds, and the next visit brings a different view. For Bremerton muralist FRO, Jonathan Perry, that changing wall helped turn experimentation into a large-scale practice.
“If it wasn’t for the Free Wall, I probably wouldn’t be as good as I am now,” he told us for Tideland. He has painted there with his partner Nocto, tried out striking characters and used the wall to say something about the moment. Some pieces disappear quickly; that is part of what makes stopping by feel immediate. You are seeing a living canvas, not a fixed exhibit.
FRO’s mark also reaches downtown. At the Quincy Jones mural near Fourth Street and Washington Avenue, he collaborated on a tribute designed and painted by KaDavien Baylor, alongside Erica Applewhite and Cory Bennett. Look closely and you see more than one artist’s hand in the city’s public story.
On a soft-season day, start at the Manette Free Wall near East 11th Street, cross the bridge, and find the Quincy Jones mural at Fourth and Washington. The wall may look different from the photographs in this story. That is your reason to go see it for yourself. Stay for dinner or an evening show, then wake up with time to explore another side of Bremerton.
Make it a visit: Plan your Bremerton stay and give the art more than a quick pass on your way through town.