Portland Music Mural to Host Selfie Contest in March

The Portland Music Mural at Southwest 11th Avenue and Morrison Street downtown celebrates 25 of Portland’s greatest musicians over the past 60 years. To drum up awareness of the 50-by-22-foot painting, the producer behind the project is running a selfie contest on Instagram starting March 1. The occasion is the six-month anniversary of the mural’s unveiling.

“I wanted to commemorate that because it was kind of a big deal for me getting it done, and I wanted to do something to keep it in the public eye,” producer Jason Savage says.

Social media users are encouraged to pose for a selfie in front of the mural, which is painted on the east-facing wall of the Mayer Building at 1130 SW Morrison St. (It’s just one block north of the Multnomah County Central Library that just reopened last week after a year of renovations.) Contestants must be following @MusicMuralProject on Instagram and tag their selfie with #PMMSelfieContest2024. Whoever gets the most “likes” wins.

The grand prize is a one-night stay at the Hotel Zags (winner must be 21 or over to claim that one). Second- and third-place winners will get gifts from Water Avenue Coffee, Music Millennium or Fried Egg I’m in Love. Savage’s only selfie advice was to “encourage creativity”—and follow the rules of Instagram.

About five years ago, Savage, a photographer, noticed that Los Angeles had a mural of the late songwriter Elliott Smith but Portland didn’t have any comprehensive public art tributes to our most famous musicians such as Smith or the Kingsmen (“Louie Louie”). Savage conceptualized the mural and fundraised for it; the Pander Brothers painted it with the help of Keri Hughes.

Artists on the mural in addition to Smith and the Kingsmen include Esperanza Spalding, The Decemberists, Sleater-Kinney and Mel Brown. The featured musicians are either from Portland or relocated here and became part of the city’s soundtrack, Savage says.

“There could have been a lot more, but we didn’t want it to be crowded or overly busy, so we limited it to 25,” Savage says. “We tried to represent different genres and eras.”

The black border was recently tagged with graffiti, and Savage had to go paint over it last week; an anti-graffiti sealant has been in place since its unveiling to protect it from catastrophic damage.

“Hopefully, this contest will get people to go downtown and help revitalize the area because that was one of my goals for the mural,” he says.

The Portland Music Mural selfie contest runs March 1-31.