Sign-painting is in this Salt Lake City artist’s blood, and her work is unavoidable

Salt Lake City residents may not know of Shley Kinser, but they almost certainly know her work.

A 40-foot graphic for Spy Hop on 900 South. A musical ode on a wall outside the Hip-Hop Education Resource Center. A massive old-timey mural at Gracie’s Gastro Pub. A kaleidoscope mural at Blended Table. An antique-style piece inside Templin Family Brewing.

Kinser grew up in a Utah sign shop — Schmidt Signs and Graphics — where she studied under her family and a mentor, Ken Shelley. Creativity, she said, was always part of her family.

“I’m actually a fourth-generation sign painter and muralist,” Kinser said. “That is in my blood.”

Signs from Schmidt’s have been seen in Utah for over seven decades, Kinser said. She worked there for 17 years while doing murals on the side. Within the past two years, Kinser started creating murals full-time.

“I feel really proud and honored,” she said, “to carry on the legacy.”

Kinser, however, caught the artistic bug long before her work at Schmidt’s.

“Somewhere along the way, my mom realized that if she sat me down at a table with all the art supplies,” Kinser said, “she could get three or four hours worth of stuff done while I was quietly sitting in a spot.”

Kinser’s work extends across the Salt Lake Valley, from Murray to West Jordan and South Jordan to Salt Lake City. She’s also done work in other states like Oregon.

Custom work every time

Every piece she works on is unique, she said, and so is her process in completing it.

“Each project is 1,000% bespoke to the client and to the neighborhood that it exists in,” Kinser said. “I try to be really sensitive about what an environment lacks and maybe needs, as well as cultural [and] visual impact.”

Kinser said she works with her clients to make sure she gets across their ideas of a narrative, while incorporating her own interpretation.

“I’m always trying to uplift the folks around me,” she said, “and I find often in my art process, I like to say what I’m for more than what I’m against.”

For example, she completed a mural for Salt Lake City’s romance-only bookstore, Lovebound Library on 900 South, which recently expanded to include a lounge space for customers. Kinser’s colorful work resides not only on the building’s exterior and doors, but also in the new lounge.

Kinser said Courtney Stookey, the owner of Lovebound, came to her with “this idea of creating a very uplifting and welcoming mural that would sort of be a hug.”

“We had talked a lot about inclusivity within romance,” Kinser said, adding that the two of them discussed representing people from a variety of backgrounds who experience different types of affection, such as platonic love or polyamory.

The task of the artwork, she said, was conveying the different ways people love one another.

“When [Stookey] and I were developing the concept, something kind of personal had come up for me,” Kinser said, “which is that when I’m dreaming, I can only fly when I’m with my siblings or with my beloved friends.”

That idea became a jumping off point, and the final product showcases traces of Kinser’s dreams — a swirl of pink clouds with flying books, while readers hover in the air above a bright pink castle.

A nod to Kinser’s roots

Kinser’s favorite mural she’s done is one that is close to her own heart — a piece she completed a few years back at The Old Dutch Store on Highland Drive.

“The Old Dutch Store has a lot of history in my family,” she said.

Kinser’s family is Dutch and has visited the store since she was a small child. Her great-grandfather even painted a faded ghost sign (a sign that has outlived the sign-painter who created it, Kinser said) in the backyard of the space.

“My grandparents and the owner’s grandparents,” Kinser said, “used to go out dancing together back in the day.”

She noticed the business’s storefront could use some attention, so she approached the owner and pitched the idea of giving the exterior a face-lift.

Kinser took the exterior from pink to blue, added new signage, painted the windmill and added a list of services on the side of the building. There’s also a small mural on the side, Kinser said, which she describes as a “sort of Delft blue.”

“Which is traditionally [a] Dutch plate design with a windmill on the side,” she said. “It’s the project that has made the biggest difference for the business owner, but also for the community that exists that frequents that business.”

Kinser said seeing her own art around town is something she tends to downplay because she grew up working in a sign shop and got used to seeing her work around the community at a young age.

“It’s maybe a thing that I don’t give [myself] enough credit for personally along the way,” she said, “but when I do allow myself a moment to really consider it, I’m mostly just honored that I’m able to help Salt Lake City stay authentic.”

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