Dear Petition Supporters,

Thank you for signing and standing up against Mayor Smiley’s push to erase Iryna Zarutska’s memory. Your voices helped create pressure that forced this issue into the open.

We have a partial victory to report: a new mural of Iryna has gone up on the side of Opa Restaurant, a Lebanese restaurant on Atwells Avenue in Providence’s Federal Hill neighborhood. The brave immigrant owned business stepped forward after The Dark Lady was pressured into removing the original. The same talented artist, Ian Gaudreau, created it.

It’s still a beautiful tribute, and we’re glad Iryna’s story isn’t completely wiped from public view.

But this is no real win. The new mural is much smaller, tucked away on a side wall, and far less visible than the large, prominent mural originally planned for Snow Street in downtown Providence. What should have been a bold, city-center memorial is now reduced to something you can easily miss.

This feels like exactly what Mayor Smiley and the activists wanted: out of sight, out of mind. They called a simple memorial “divisive” and used political pressure to bully a business into backing down. Now Iryna a young Ukrainian refugee whose life was tragically stolen gets a diminished tribute hidden on a side street instead of the visible public honor she deserved.

It’s infuriating that in the so-called “Creative Capital,” honoring a murdered immigrant is treated as controversial while real division is ignored. I appreciate Opa Restaurant's courage in hosting the mural, but we remain outraged that city leadership helped shrink and sideline it.

Our fight is not over. We will not accept this quiet erasure. We continue to demand that Mayor Smiley and city officials stop censoring public art and allow Iryna’s memory to be honored properly and visibly.

Thank you for your continued support. Together, we’ll keep fighting so Iryna is remembered the way she should be.

With determination, 

Anthony D'Ellena