Screen Painting: A Baltimore Tradition

The art of screen painting began out of necessity. A grocer from Czechoslovakia noticed in 1913, that the heat, the sun and the humidity was wilting his produce displays. Upon moving his displays inside his store, he then had to come up with a colorful way to entice people inside. His name was William Oktavec, and he had no idea that he was about to change a bit of art history, he really just wanted to sell his fruits and vegetables.

Oktavec painted his window screens, and just a few days after he did this, one of the regular shoppers of his store came in and asked if he would paint her screens. She had a favorite photo she had found in a calender, and she wanted that reproduced. Soon, the Czechoslovakian grocer was the artist of the neighborhood, painting the screens of businesses, houses, restaurants and the luxury hotels of the city of Baltimore. Not only were the painted shades decorative, but they offered further privacy as well, for even though people could not see in, the inhabitants could still see out. Soon this became a pastime of many of the people of the neighborhood, and creativity was flowing.

Tom Lipka was a famous screen painter, and in his memoirs he states that in the years of the 1920′s through the 1940′s you could not walk down any of the streets in Baltimore, without seeing someone hard at work, painting their screens. This tradition fell out of practice in the years following WWII, but in 1988, Elaine Eff formed a society, the Painted Screen Society, in order to educate the people of the city about this tradition that seemed so long gone.

During this year, PBS produced a film about the tradition, “The Screen Painters“, which not only gained awards but illustrated to the country this time honored tradition. Now when locals or visitors walk down the city streets, they will notice the brightly colored paintings, some of them more like murals, and a bit of history is revealed.

Hip Young Things

Screen Painting: A Baltimore Tradition

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