Clarification: Parole office mural story raises questions

City Pulse’s Oct. 29 cover story, “Masterpiece in the Parole Office,” drew a strong response from the family of Eugene Curtis Stephenson, a Lansing artist and formerly incarcerated person who worked on a mural recently completed on the walls of the Ingham County Parole Office at 5341 S. Pennsylvania Ave. in south Lansing.

Stephenson’s sister, Autumn Vanasse, said artist Martín Vargas’s account of the genesis and completion of the mural, as reported in the story, was “inaccurate.”

The 34-foot-long mural symbolically depicts the parolee’s journey from gray prison bars to a serene landscape of trees and blue sky.

Vanasse said Vargas minimized her brother’s role in painting the mural.

Stephenson died in an auto accident Oct. 9, a week before the mural was finished.

Vanasse said Stephenson was juggling work on the mural with a full-time job and family responsibilities.

“Martín said he did the whole thing himself, and made my brother sound non-committed and reckless, and that’s not the case,” she said. “My brother was there more times than Martin has led everyone to believe.”

Vargas said he worked on the mural 65 days and Stephenson worked on it “maybe 10 days.”

Photos and TikTok videos show the two artists working together, with Stephenson working on trees at the center of the mural.

“He was a beautiful artist, and they both did a wonderful job,” Vanasse said. “But Martin did not do this alone, as the article made it out to sound.”