1239, 1235, and 1229 Hertel Avenue, Buffalo NY, 14216 (Get Directions) 

(In Progress)

“If your heart dare, meet me in the garden at midnight, when my favorite flowers bloom again.” 
-Ola Volo

Ola Volo is a Canadian mural artist and illustrator from Kazakhstan with a distinctive style drawn from folklore, multiculturalism, and female identity. Her intricate works bring animals, people, architecture, and nature together to articulate diverse stories rich with symbolism and elaborate forms. Volo creates complex narratives that foreground the subtleties of human nature while celebrating the little surprises of everyday life. 

Volo will be producing the most immersive mural that the Buffalo AKG Art Museum's Public Art Initiative has ever commissioned. The work will span three neighboring buildings along Hertel Avenue, with The Monocle at 1235 Hertel as the central anchor. Her imagery will spill over onto the adjacent buildings, creating an enveloping, immersive, and mesmerizing experience. 

Volo is renowned for her intricate storytelling through vibrant colors and bold lines. For this commission, Volo merges the avian symbols of the peacock and the heron with the rich cultural heritage of her native Slavic Poland, also portraying a woman adorned in a tapestry of feathers connected to a magical garden of flowers and birds.

In one section of the mural, the peacock, traditionally symbolizing protection, beauty, and renewal in Slavic folklore, envelops the woman's figure like a shield of armor. Each detailed feather in the mural not only highlights the bird's natural splendor but also serves as a metaphor for the protective and nurturing qualities associated with women and femineity.
 

 Volo also captures the essence of resilience and regeneration in her imagery. The peacock, with its association with immortality and the cyclical nature of life, symbolizes the eternal sequences of birth, death, and rebirth present in Slavic mythology. Volo's artwork celebrates the timeless qualities of protection, beauty, and renewal, resonating with both ancient mythology and contemporary interpretation.

Other elements of the mural will feature mythological birds rooted in Slavic folklore, inspired explicitly by the classic folk tale, "The Firebird’s Orchard." In that story, the Firebird guards a hidden garden filled with healing fruits. The bird symbolizes mystery, light, and forbidden beauty—echoing the essence of this enchanted world and emphasizing the mural’s themes of femininity, transformation, and folklore, while adding a dreamlike and poetic layer.

Volo’s work is female-forward, celebrating strength, beauty, resilience, wisdom, and empowerment. For this installation, she will be working with an all-female group of assistants, including well-known regional artists Julia Bottoms, Cassandra Ott, and Laura Valkwitch. Volo’s selection of these artists reflects her commitment to elevating the opportunities and visibility of women artists everywhere. 

In addition to her work with local artists, Volo has also embarked on local collaborations with Mirabo Press and RedDisk. For Mirabo Press, Volo is using imagery drawn from her early sketches and concepts for this mural project to create a unique run of monoprints that include hand-drawn and unique motifs on each print. For her work with RedDisk, a regional hand-printed wallpaper company, Volo experimented with repeat patterns also based on early renderings of the birds included in the mural design. The result of these collaborations will be complementary work to the mural, reflecting the broader talents and rich creative culture of the Western New York arts scene.