Denver’s popular Crush Walls mural festival will not take place in 2021, following news that it will officially move out of its longtime home in the River North Art District, founder and artist Robin Munro wrote in .
The statement, credited to the festival’s founder and signed “Creative Rituals Under Social Harmony,” does not mention the allegations of sexual assault against Munro by multiple women. The allegations were .
Munro did not respond to the Denverite story, but has denied the assault allegations.
The exact wording Thursday statement does not seem to take into account that RiNo Art District officials . The December 2019 break was later touted as an agreed-upon separation — following reports that RiNo officials were the ones who pushed for it.
RiNo had investigated the claims, temporarily putting contracts on hold, and on Dec. 2 independently decided to cut ties with Munro and Crush, .
The women quoted in the February Denverite story had also criticized the RiNo Art District and others for failing to respect and integrate their work into the city’s fast-rising street-art scene.
“We have parted ways with RiNo,” Munro wrote Thursday, roughly six months after his attorney, Kathryn J. Stimson, asserted the same thing. “I hold exclusive rights to hold this festival in the district till 2023. But it was never my intention to keep this confined to one space. I would love to see this grow city wide and beyond, and now I’m free to do so.”
Munro wrote that he’s fielded “several inquiries” about other locations and is working toward new areas and partnerships. He said Crush Walls will skip 2021 so he can focus on his 2-year-old son and the future of Crush.
“I would like to return in 2022 bigger and better,” he wrote.
Crush Walls, long the district’s signature event, is responsible for mural art on more than 500 walls, and for providing more than $1.5 million in artist stipends, Munro wrote.
Munro, who works under the name Dread, was not specifically named in the by former romantic partner Grow Love, who accused “the founder” of Crush Walls of “violent sexual assault” after they began dating in 2017.
The post included allegations of inappropriate interaction with Grow Love’s 8-year-old daughter, slander, and one other incident of reported sexual assault, kicking off a period of intense reckoning with abuse and assault in Denver’s arts and culture scene.
