Chicago murals: New South Loop pickleball club mural features pickles and pickles playing pickleball

To help meet Chicago’s growing demand for indoor pickleball courts, a new pickleball club, decorated by a mural wall created by more than a dozen of the city’s most prolific street artists, opened in November in the South Loop.On the south-facing wall of ChiPickle, 1900 S. Wabash Ave., 10 whimsical creatures play pickleball or are pickles themselves. There are even pickles playing pickleball. Words written in graffiti-style lettering float above them.The pickleball courts are in a building just west of South Michigan Avenue and east of Ping Tom Park.The wall includes work by artists who go by the names of Peas, Milt, Kozmo, Matr, JoeyD, Verloe, Bird milk, Elloo, Gnome174, Diosa, Ren Rock, Disem CMK, Underseagravy and more. The group included members of CMK Crew, longtime friends who have been painting and tagging together for decades, largely on the South Side.They came together again over several days this fall to brighten the wall at the request of owner Tony Chen.“I had to research pickleball,” says artist Luis Molina, who worked with Chen on a previous project. “I had no idea what it was.”He brought pizza and Modelos to share with other artists and called the experience “a whole picnic of people, painting and having fun.” The images feature whimsical creatures, some playing pickleball, some just pickles and some pickles playing pickleball.Tyler Pasciak LaRiviere/Sun-Times The mural images include Diosa’s purple vampire-like creature with a pickleball on one ear and red flames burning behind him. Kozmo’s cheeseburger-flower has an arm emerging from…

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