By Ellen Fortson

E. L. Wright Middle School, always has students shuffling up and down the steps of the massive staircase. Not just any students, but students created by muralist Sherry Larson. The life– size students appear so authentic several teachers have talked to the wall asking the students why they weren’t in class. 

“The principal, Keith Price, gave me the theme, Tradition of Excellence–1962 to the Present, to expand upon any way I thought would be representative. I had a few obstacles to contend with, such as the light, and the railing.”

Sherry Larson Larson used actual students to model for her. On one side of the staircase, she created the look of the students in 1962. On the other side, contemporary clad students in bright colors paint a picture of excitement in learning. The middle wall conveys the school’s founder, Mr. Edward L. Wright, the grounds, and the school mascot, the warrior. The middle wall serves as a bridge between the past and the future in the tradition of excellence.

The PTO has commissioned Larson to do a wall in the E. L. Wright library. “This one will be the regions of SC using the state symbols in the landscape scene,” said Larson.

The artist received her BA from the University of Arkansas and an associate degree from Atlanta School of Design. She said she was a struggling, starving artist when she first started painting murals. She bartered painting for a membership in a gym and the same thing when she moved to Columbia and painted murals at Gold’s Gym and New Life Fitness.

Sherry is married to John Lawson and is the mother of Josh and Sidney.