Long look on Longfellow

After I spotted the mailbox here at 321 N. Longfellow, I almost missed this mural alongside the driveway, set far back:

I'll never walk onto someone's property to photograph a mural; that's a view from a zoom lens. It's an iridescent mural with a cat (temporarily) on top. I was there three days ago: May 28th.

Back in (actually, on) BLX

(Apologies, AC/DC fans, for that title. :)

The longtime mural on the side of BLX Skate Shop, 7th & Toole Avenues, has been replaced by this one with movie characters:

(That's a support wire across the left edge.) I found it on May 24th.

By the way, that mural is one of the 14 shown in the article The Big Picture, by Paul M. Ingram of The New York Times Student Journalism Institute. It's a great little “newspaper” written by New York Times interns right here in Tucson.

Update (May 11, 2015): That mural is by Danny Martin. He has a little more info about it on his website; he says it's a 1980s film mural with “Beetlejuice Geena Davis / MR Stay Puft / Kurt Russell.” I also found a photo of the mural cut into a skate deck.

A Corvette for Indy 500 Day?

I was looking through my backlog of Tucson mural photos for a race car that would fit the Indy 500. (In case you're interested, here's a long list of Indy 500 history.) I didn't find what I wanted, but I did find this Corvette mural, on the west side of O'Rielly Chevrolet facing Park Place Mall. (Here's a Google Map.) It'd probably belong better at a NASCAR race, but it'll have to do.

I snapped the photo on April 6th.

Half-hidden home mural

As I was ricing along Olsen Avenue last August 15th, I spotted a mural inside the back yard of the home at 2101 East Drachman. The first glimpse was from alley between Adams and Drachman, and the second — the photo shown here — was along Olsen Avenue. It has Trompe-œ’il vigas on a home, and something below... I didn't look over the wall (and we won't show the hidden part of any mural onl a home, anyway), so imagine it for yourself!

South Tucson fire station (murals being made, part 19)

I read Arizona Daily Star reporter Kimberly Matas’ story Scouts battle graffiti with South Tucson mural in today's paper. The story didn't include a photo, though. So I went right over to the northwest corner of West 27th Street & South 5th Avenue — just behind the police and fire station — to see the mural and grab a photo:

Update (June 1, 2013): Here are close-ups after the mural was completed (as usual, you can click on a photo for an even bigger view):

For a bonus, there's an old fire engine parked next to the mural:

The article says that muralist Germaine Pesquiera guided the members of Girl Scout Troop 645, along with troop leader Pilar Ruiz. Thanks, folks, for another great piece of South Tucson street art!

Maybe a mural, part 46: Exquisite on Elm

The home at 2350 Elm Street (it's on the southwest corner of Norton & Elm) has amazing art all along its walls. A year ago, we posted a photo of two dragons at the south end, along Norton Street, in Maybe a mural, part 32: critters glued on. Along the wall on the Elm Street side, though, is another (maybe) mural, fit perfectly underneath the lamp above it:

It's a collage of “quotations” from famous artists’ work. I took the photo on May 14th.

You can see more of the art at this gallery-along-the-street on the TucsonArt.info website in the page 2350 Elm Street.

Joe Pagac at Bookmans, August 2012

Since Joe Pagac stopped re-painting the east wall of the Rialto Theatre a while back (you can see his last — and permanent? — mural in our March 7th, 2013 post), I've still spotted new work of his from time to time on the east wall of the Bookmans store at 1930 E. Grant. (But I haven't stopped by for a while.)

Let's go back to the archives for a photo from August 15, 2012. It's a happy family playing music, games, and reading a book (all things, coincidentally, you can get at Bookmans) in a park somewhere with downtown Tucson behind:

More from 103 S. Calle de Jardin

On February 17, 2010, we showed the mural-covered home at 103 S. Calle de Jardin. Last month, I came back on April 25th for a close-up of the mailbox at the south end of that wall that I'd shot in 2010. While I was there, I noticed murals and tile near the home's driveway — as well as the artist's signature: 11-5-2002 Manny Garcia.

(Here's the photo of the mailbox — from the Tucson Mailbox Art blog.)

Sabor Tropical

These delicious murals are outside Sabor Tropical restaurant, 1929 East Grant:

I took the photos on August 15, 2012.

120 South Calle de Jardin

The home in this artsy corner of the San Clemente neighborhood has a couple of murals (bring binoculars or a zoom lens; they're far enough into the property that you probably won't want to walk up to them).

Appropriately enough for a home on a street named “garden” (in Spanish), one mural is the climbing flowers that start in an actual pot (click for a closer view; look for the green paint inside the pot). There's also a mural with two quail and an “address rock” by the driveway that's painted with critters (in cave-painting style, maybe?).

The home also has one of a pair of bright green mailboxes in an artistic setting; click there to see it on the Tucson Mailbox Art blog.

I wandered through on April 25th. (You can find more on Calle de Jardin by typing the street name into the search box at the right side of this blog.)

Love Bug Road

The sign over the Volkswagen “bug” in the carport is just one of the bits of art on the front of this (obviously) well-loved home at 5772 E. Whittier:

It's along the route of my favorite shortcut from “the back door” of Park Place Mall toward the south part of Tucson. I'm hoping to add routes like these to my Tucson Bicycling page (which, like so many of my volunteer projects, is waiting for me to find more time to finish it). I rolled by on July 19, 2012.

Maybe a mural, part 45: Garage door with tile

Our occasional “maybe a mural” series is for art that you might or might not think of as “a nural.” This garage door fits that description:

The home is at 106 S. Calle de Jardin — part of an art-filled neighborhood that's worth a visit! Here's a Mapquest map. There's a close-up of the maildrop on the Tucson Mailbox Art blog (click there to see it).

I stopped by (for quite a while!) on April 25th.

Murals, mailboxes & more in May

The Tucson Mailbox Art blog has been online since December, and the Tucson Art Information website (including its public art section) is being expanded. Last week, when I was in an art-filled corner of the San Clemente neighborhood, I saw artistic mailboxes, murals, and sculpture together... and realized that I could cross-post homes or businesses that have (say) both a mailbox and a mural. So, from time to time during May, you'll see posts like this one — with a link to click so you can see (in this case) the mailbox in the middle of the mural. Other days I'll post a mailbox and add some sculpture to the public-art section. So “stay tuned!”

That's the front wall of 233 S. El Volador on April 25th. See the mailbox at the left side? (As always, you can click for a larger view.) There are two close-ups on the mailbox blog.