How to Paint a 'Love Letter' to a City

In the Bromo Seltzer Arts Tower in downtown Baltimore, a big, brusque guy runs a pop-up sign-painting studio with a few partners, known collectively as ICY Signs. You can call and call the phone number listed for the shop, but no one ever seems to pick up. "It's open when we're there. And we're not there," explains Stephen Powers, brusquely. It's probably easier to head out and try to find the work of ICY Signs and Powers—still known to some as ESPO, the tag Powers used to write graffiti for 15 years—on your own.

Over the past several months, Powers and his crew have worked in several East and Southwest Baltimore neighborhoods, on blocks that have seen decades of blight and neglect. There are abandoned houses, drug activity, violence. There are also people who love these communities, who've lived in these parts of the city for their entire lives.