NEWBERG, Ore. — After two years of hauling four-foot square wooden panels to various community events, the Newberg Public Art Council has officially unveiled a series of community-painted murals downtown as part of the Camellia Trail, a paint-by-number project celebrating the camellia, Newberg’s official city flower.
“It’s really rewarding to see the project out in the community after all the work that went into it,” said Crystal Trice, the Newberg Public Art Council public art manager. “We still have a few panels that we can put up, but getting the trail established has been a big undertaking, and we’ve learned a lot along the way about navigating the processes involved with public art.”
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The council commissioned six local artists to create original camellia-themed paintings, according to the Newberg Public Art Council website. Volunteers digitized each painting into a paint-by-number design, traced and numbered the outlines onto 4-by-4-foot plywood panels, and brought the panels to community events for residents to paint. The finished mini-murals now hang at downtown businesses along the trail.
Trice said the idea originated at a council meeting focused on the organization’s broader goal of creating community through art. Loni Parrish, owner of Art Elements Gallery and a council member, initially wrote a grant proposal for a larger version of the project, but the proposal was not funded. The council later received a companion grant through the Yamhill County Cultural Coalition, prompting organizers to redesign the project with fewer resources.
“At its heart, the Camellia Trail is about creating community through art,” Trice said.
She said the project was also intended to celebrate Newberg’s official flower and bring it into the downtown landscape in an unconventional way. The paint-by-number format let community members help create the artwork rather than simply view it.
Artists were selected in two rounds, Trice said. For the first round, organizers invited artists already known to the council through their community involvement. For the second, the council issued an open call to artists with a particular focus on reaching Newberg’s Hispanic community, Trice said. All of the artists came from Newberg or the surrounding area, which Trice said was important so the project would reflect local creativity.
The first community painting event took place at the Wednesday Market in 2024, where market goers were invited to paint a portion of the paint-by-number-style painting while they perused local fruits, vegetables, and other goods. Organizers also brought painting panels to Tunes on Tuesday, the Old Fashioned Festival, First Friday ARTwalk, and an event at the Chehalem Cultural Center’s Mercado, rather than holding a single large painting event.
She said the council does not have an exact count of how many events were held or how many people participated, but estimated that hundreds of residents helped paint the murals over the course of the project.
Each mural also includes a small hidden image of a mouse designed by local artist Sarah Joy Silvia, inspired by NPAC’s bronze mouse sculpture Maestro, that visitors can search for while exploring downtown.
Trice said the Camellia Trail is largely complete, though a handful of additional panels have yet to be installed. She said the project taught the council lessons about navigating the logistics of public art that organizers hope will streamline future efforts.
“It’s really rewarding to see the project out in the community after all the work that went into it,” Trice said.
While Trice said the Camellia Trail itself is likely finished as a standalone project, she said it helped inspire Blooming Together, a temporary flower installation made from recycled materials and community-painted pieces.
The project received funding support from the Oregon Arts Commission, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Oregon Cultural Trust, and the Austin Family Foundation, according to the council’s website. Parr Lumber and Lake Oswego Drywall and Construction Inc. also provided support, the website states.
Learn more at the NPAC website.
Slideshow below: photos of Camellia Trail painting installations (Eric Hemmer / NPAC)
Disclosure: Newsberg editor Branden Andersen was previously the executive director and board president of the Newberg Downtown Coalition, which operates the Newberg Public Art Council.
