MYSTERY PHOTO: Old picture of old place

Here’s an old picture of an old place in South Carolina.  What and where is it?  For bonus points, what’s its significance?  Send your best guess to editor@charlestoncurrents.com. And don’t forget to include your name and the town in which you live.

Our previous mystery, “Maybe our most difficult mystery yet,” must not have been that tough, thanks to anyone who knows how to do an image search via ye olde Internet.  The mural of Anthony Bourdain, Albert Einstein, Jimi Hendrix and Salvador Dali is on the side of the empty Roumillat’s antiques building on Savannah Highway in West Ashley.

Allan Peel of San Antonio, Texas, told us all about the mural, painted by Garrett Mallekoote:  “The mural consists of four separate panels depicting the images of four highly influential people from the arts and science community, namely Anthony Bourdain, Albert Einstein, Jimi Hendrix and Salvador Dali. I was unable to determine exactly when the mural was painted, but I do know that it was created in 2019, sometime after August 2019. How do I know? Well, Mallekoote’s Facebook page states that this particular mural was created in 2019, although a specific date is not referenced. So I examined past Google Maps Street View images of the building at 2241 Savannah Hwy, images of which exist as far back as October 2011. The mural was not present between October 2011 and August 2019. Therefore it must have been created sometime between August 2019 and December 2019.

“So just who is the artist who created the mural? It is Garrett Mallekoote, who currently lives in Charleston, but was originally from Fort Mill, S.C. A United States Marine Corp veteran, Mallekoote is a freelance artist as well as a professional tattoo artist specializing in neo-traditional and black and grey tattoos. He currently works at Charleston Tattoo Company and has been perfecting his tattooing skills since 2017.  Mallekoote is the winner of a number of awards bestowed upon him through the tattoo artist community at tattooawards.com.  As of today, this community of artists has awarded Mallekoote with 52 separate awards, and I expect that number will continue to grow.”

Thanks Allan!  And hats off to all of the others who identified the mural: Charlene Johnson of Beaufort; Legare Clement, Kristina Wheeler and Peggi Angel, all of Charleston; Amanda Tello of Port Royal; Marnie Huger of Richmond, Va.; Holly Bryan of Johns Island; Don Clark of Hartsville; George Graf of Palmyra, Va.; Jay Altman of Columbia; Berry Davenport of James Island; and Jason White.

• Send us a mystery:  If you have a photo that you believe will stump readers, send it along (but make sure to tell us what it is because it may stump us too!)   Send it along to  editor@charlestoncurrents.com.