Rockafellas' Murals Create a Space with Style

In art, as in business, it’s not just what you know, but who you know.

The origins of the striking airbrushed murals in Rockafellas Bar & Grill on Darnestown Rd. were far away in Hawaii, where a good friend of Hyattsville artist Gene Garbowski was neighbors with Jennifer Tempchin, whose father Bill and brother Matt were starting up the restaurant. She suggested they make a connection.

Soon Garbowski was in the restaurant with his iPad portfolio, which includes everything from outdoor murals at the Irish Inn at Glen Echo to custom designs on motorcycles, race cars and even fire trucks. He painted a dragon on a Tibetan Buddhist Center, and paints team logos and other art in school gyms.

He and the Tempchins did some brainstorming about what the entryway mural theme should be. After rejecting themes including the Old West, a drive-in restaurant with classic cars and a sports mural, they decided to portray their bar instead.

“I went around and just took pictures of people sitting in the bar area and then I did a pencil sketch, and showed it to them, and they liked it," Garbowski said. "They asked me to make some changes, specifically saying there weren’t enough pretty girls."

So, Garbowski added Matt’s three sisters, his girlfriend and his mother.

Many patrons watched the mural go up piece by piece as Garbowski worked through the nights after closing.

“Regulars were asking if they could be put in the mural, even trying to bribe us,” Matt said. But the owners figured if they ever had trouble with a patron pictured realistically in the mural they’d have to paint over them, so patrons are portrayed instead in a softer more idealistic way that obscures their identity.    

The largest mural covers two walls of the lounge area inside the entrance to Rockafellas. Easily identifiable to those in the know are Bill Tempchin (in old Western garb, a nod to the not-chosen theme), his three daughters, his wife and son Matt. One of the bar TV's in the mural slyly shows a commercial for Bill Tempchin Auto Sales, the patriarch’s former business.  

In addition to the large front mural, there are two smaller ones around the corner facing into the restaurant from the entrance to a server station. The space reminded Bill of a superhero busting out of a phone booth, so one mural depicts Superman, he said.

To cater to the female patrons, Garbowski added two dancers à la “Dancing with the Stars.” The main mural took three weeks of actual painting, then Superman and the dancers were each done in two days.  

While he said he appreciates its look - and said “patrons think it’s pretty cool" -- Matt also takes a practical view of the mural versus wall art.

“We don’t have to worry about anybody stealing it or messing it up. Dollar for dollar it’s cheaper to fill that type of space,” he said.