The Percy Street Project’s Fall Finale brought live music, painting, murals and more than 40 vendors to 1300 S. Percy St. on Friday, turning the South Philadelphia block known as “Electric Street” into a First Friday gathering featuring local artists, makers and food vendors.

But for some of the artists on the block, the night was about more than showing finished work. Visitors could watch artists create, hear the ideas behind their pieces and see how personal stories can become part of the work itself.

J. Eliza Walls, who has worked as an artist in Philadelphia for 12 years, was painting over a mural she originally created on Percy Street in 2022. The mural connects to her novel, Like the Sun Holds the Moon, bringing a piece of her previous work back into the same Philadelphia space in a new form.

Walls described being an artist as a trade and spoke about the work she has built over more than a decade in Philadelphia. Her return to the Percy Street mural also showed how artwork can change over time while remaining connected to the story that inspired it.

Artist Roselyn was creating an iguana while exploring the line between animals that are real and creatures that exist in the imagination. Her work played with the idea of fictional animals that can feel familiar even when they do not actually exist.

Another artist, Bryan, talked about “taking the bite out of the world” and said the piece came from a vision he had. His work added another perspective to the event, where the artists were not only displaying what they made but explaining the ideas that led them there.

The live painting throughout the event gave visitors a chance to see that process firsthand. Instead of walking into a gallery and only seeing the finished product, people along Percy Street could watch artists work while music, vendors and other activity continued around them.

The Percy Street Project’s Fall Finale brought together more than 40 vendors, live painting, music and other activities as part of the First Friday gathering. The event also created space for local artists to connect with people outside of a traditional gallery setting.

For Walls, Roselyn and Bryan, the artwork on display came from different places — a novel and a mural, imaginary creatures and a personal vision. Together, their work showed the different ways artists can turn an idea into something people can see, experience and talk about.