The St. Lawrence Power Project mural by Canadian artist Harold Town has been digitally copied and reproduced for all to see in the new St. Lawrence Power Development Visitor Centre.

PHOTO CREDIT - OurHometown.ca

Cornwall - Apr. 4, 2011 - Visitors to the new St. Lawrence Power Development Visitor Centre will be treated to some spectacular views of the power dam - and a spectacular piece of art as well.

One of the auditorium walls in the new visitor centre has been outfitted with a digital replica of the 1958 St. Lawrence Power Project mural by Canadian artist Harold Town.

The original mural - which measures 11 by 3 metres - is affixed to a wall on the sixth floor of the R.H. Saunders Generating Station with a special adhesive.

Rather than risk damaging the original, officials decided to reproduce it and place it on the auditorium wall in the new visitor centre so that people can continue to see and appreciate the work.

"The mural has come to symbolize the era during which the St. Lawrence Power Project was constructed, like a snapshot frozen in time. Harold Town preserved, in a style contemporary to that era, the feelings and aspirations of many who experienced the upheaval and promise of a bright future," reads an information sheet on the mural.

A Toronto artist, Town was 34 when the Hydro-Electric Power Commission of Ontario commissioned him to create the work of art. Town began the work in May 1958 in one of the galleries at the Canadian Exhibition Grounds in Toronto, and the massive mural was completed on a single canvas within a few months.

Town died in 1990.

For those who want to see or learn more about the mural, the visitor centre will be open Monday to Friday from 9:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. beginning May 2.