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Poet Etheridge Knight will follow cycling champion Major Taylor and hair-product entrepreneur Madam C.J. Walker to become the third subject in the “Bicentennial Legends” mural series.
An image of Knight will be displayed on the side of a building on Massachusetts Avenue, said Julia Muney Moore, director of public art for the Indy Arts Council.
Knight, who died in 1991 at age 59, was a leader of the Black Arts Movement in the 1960s and ’70s. The Mississippi native moved to Indianapolis in the 1950s after serving in the U.S. Army.
He wrote his first book of poetry, “Poems from Prison,” while serving a 10- to 25-year sentence at the Indiana State Prison in Michigan City. Knight was arrested for robbing a convenience store in 1960.
“I died in Korea from a shrapnel wound, and narcotics resurrected me,” Knight wrote when “Poems from Prison” was published in 1968. ‘I died in 1960 from a prison sentence and poetry brought me back to life.”
Moore said the arts council is confirming the location where the Knight mural will be displayed. Massachusetts Avenue buildings already are home to murals devoted to two Indianapolis literary icons: Kurt Vonnegut and Mari Evans.
Knight lived in the Barton Tower apartment building, 555 Massachusetts Ave.
“He had a personal connection to Mass Ave,” Moore said. “That’s where he had his ‘Free Peoples Poetry’ workshops. He had a lot of friends around there.”
In 1990, Knight graduated from Martin University, known then as Martin Center College, and was named as the school’s first poet laureate.
The Etheridge Knight Festival of the Arts was presented annually in Indianapolis from 1992 through 2012.
Knight’s great-niece, Hanako Gavia, works at Butler University as assistant director for the Center for Citizenship and Community. In 2021, Butler students launched the EK Free Peoples Project as an online tribute to Knight.
The artist for Knight’s mural has yet to be selected. Three finalists will present concepts during an online video conference scheduled for March 4, Moore said.
Members of the public are invited to watch the presentation hosted by the Center for Black Literature and Culture at the Central Library of the Indianapolis Public Library.
Shawn Warren painted the Taylor mural and Tasha Beckwith painted the Walker mural.
For more information about the “Bicentennial Legends” mural series, visit indyarts.org.
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