Signs morph into a banana

Foe years now, muralist Joe Pagac has been painting murals on the east side of the Rialto Theatre. Most of the murals were about upcoming concerts, but the right end of the murals sprouted something new in 2012: a man holding a sort-of protest sign. From time to time, the sign changed. A few years later, a change on the building led to a change on the sign. Let's take a look.

April 11, 2012
May 17, 2012
February 23, 2013
December 25, 2013
December 21, 2014
March 7, 2015

In the next-to-last view above, a new drainspout covered the right end of the mural. Joe didn't wait long to replace the half-covered man with a painting showing the man's arm wrapped around the drainspout... and, instead of holding a sign in his other hand, he holds up a banana. Brilliant... and fun!

I'm not sure that I caught all of the signs over the years, but you get the idea. Thanks, Joe.

10th and Park, part 2

In Monday's entry, we showed a block party last Saturday around the corner of 10th Street and Park Avenue. I had to leave before the murals were done, so I came back Sunday morning to grab some photos. What I found was...

...nothing except the building as it looked before Saturday's event. (The empty space at the right edge was where a group was painting a black-and-white mural; the two spaces on the left side had the color murals being made.)

I tweeted Kristin Tovar, @WhyILiveWhereILive, on Twitter to ask if she knew the story. The building owner wanted the murals to be mobile, she wrote; they were attached in frames and with rope for just that reason. The artists decided to take the murals after the day was over. She sent along a photo she found of the mural after the group of painters had finished it:

I'll try to keep you in touch with murals from Why I Love Where I Live and the Community Mural Project.

10th and Park, part 1

Saturday the 25th was a celebration at the corner of 10th Street and Park Avenue: a community mural project to brighten up the gray walls of the building on the southwest corner.

Today! pic.twitter.com/bmu1O1RAOP

— Words On The Avenue (@WordsOnTheAve) April 25, 2015

The main attraction was probably the mural being painted on a piece of cloth tied to the north side of that building — for Words on the Avenue:

I hadn't heard of Words on the Avenue. People told me that they have a monthly open-mic evening to, as their Twitter profile says, “... unify the writing world by creating a space where all genres can co-exist. Find us at Café Passé every last Sunday of the Month.”

To the left is a closeup of one of the muralists.

Sketch artist Chelsea showed me the mural design. The original plan was to project the design onto the canvas and trace it out in fine lines. But the light was too bright. Drawing a grid over the design, then repeating the grid on the white background of the mural, did the job. Next, a closeup showing the design and the grid:

Kristin, one of the organizers, told me that the mural would be finished when I saw WORDS ON THE AVENUE above the mural design. (More on that later...)

This mural was only part of the celebration. Students chalked thank-you notes on the sidewalk in front of the TUSD (Tucson Unified School District) building on the southeast corner. The middle of the intersection was filled with potted desert plants and a flower painted around the cover in the center. "STREET CLOSED" barricades and food trucks opened the corner for everyone to walk through from side to side. Two other murals were being made for the east side of 95 South Park. The first photo below shows artists making a mural, and the second shows the other mural next to a “What do you want in your neighborhood?” suggestion board:

I left the party after an hour or so, before the first mural was done. I came back the next day — on Sunday morning — to snap photos of the rest of what had happened. The picture wasn't pretty, as you'll see next time...

Settling down at Seventh & Toole?

The business at 7th & Toole that used to hold BLX, and its series of “blocks” murals, stood empty for a while. Last we saw here was a mural posted on December 8, 2014. By February 27, 2015, the picture had changed:

The new business here is Take Flight Yoga and Movement. They've kept the skate-able track underneath the mural that was added when the BLX skate shop used to be here.

Borderlands in between

In the past month or so, you've probably seen plenty of photos of Joe Pagac's new mural along the railroad tracks behind Borderlands Brewing Company. Though I try to post photos in the order I get them, sometimes (like this case) Joe worked faster than I did! So now I'm backtracking a bit.

I've just updated the April 1st entry, Joe Pagac finishing Borderlands Brewing mural, to include some photos from February showing the mural about halfway done. That entry also has a link to the one on April 10th showing the mural finished.

Let's see if I can keep up in the future. (So much art, so little time! :)

Temporary on Toole

Along tilted Toole Avenue (which runs diagonally from northwest to southeast, but it's called East Toole) are two panels with five murals each. There's often a fresh mural or two each time I ride by — for instance, on February 27th:

I didn't remember the two at the right end, so I'm pretty sure that I haven't shown them here. (There's so much art along Toole that it's easy to lose track!) Here's the first of the new ones — the fourth from left to right. The javelina is thinking “I despise those humans and their garbage!” It's signed Gabriel Ruiz Villegas 2/12/15:

And the mural at the right end looks to me like an underwater scene:

I think the “waves” rippling across the mural may be wrinkles in paper or cloth that the mural was printed on.

Art on a prison? Yes!

Last time, we saw a mural by Cristina Cárdenas at 29th & 4th in South Tucson. She also told me about another mural of hers in a place I wouldn't have thought to look: the Minimum Security Facility on South Mission Road. Although it's too bad that people inside the prison can't see the mural, it sure brightens the view from outside! A sign on the fence warned me to stay 20 feet away from it, so a photo had to show the fence.

Here's a closeup (which, as always, you can click on to get an even larger view):

Outside of the fence is a low wall with tile that echoes the mural. Here's the left end (with just a bit of the mural visible at top left):

And the right end; you'll want to click to see more detail:

I snapped the photos on February 11th.

South Tucson at 29th & 4th

When I met Cristina Cárdenas earlier this year, she told me about two murals of hers that haven't been shown here. I grabbed photos of the first (and the next) on February 11th:

More of Cristina's art on April 17th!

(By the way, Cristina also created the art at the western-most streetcar stop. Here's an Arizona Daily Star article about art at all the streetcar stops.)

Update (April 16, 2015) As I was writing the next entry, I did more searching for a Web or Facebook page of Cristina's. I didn't find one, but I did find a YouTube video that shows some of her art, has her story of emigrating from Mexico, and tells the story of the mural above:



The mural story starts at 10:38 into the video, and you can see just that part by clicking there.

Joe Pagac's Borderlands Brewing mural

On April 1, we showed Joe Pagac finishing Borderlands Brewing mural. I rode right over to see it on the 5th. It's one of Tucson's biggest murals, filled with Western vistas and humans in animals' bodies. Here's the mural in its surroundings:

(As always, you can click for a larger view.)

Let's move in closer and look at the two halves:

Close-ups of the animal-people, left to right:

Amazing work, Joe.

Update (May 26, 2015): David Aber sent photos of the mural. He pointed out that the top and bottom parts don't seem to line up:

Maybe by walking over to the edge of the mural, so you see the two parts at an angle, they might match up? Interesting.

Update (December 19, 2015): David Aber wrote:

Back in May, you and I had a discussion about Joe Pagac’s mural on the Borderlands Brewing Building. We couldn’t get the upper and lower parts of the mural to line up.....but this guy can:

Surreal Fantasy Mural Panorama <<>> Tucson's Warehouse Arts District

Update (December 24, 2015): David Aber sent email to artist Joe Pagac about the alignment issue. Joe wrote back:

Hey!

Glad you like the mural so much! I'm working on a few more in the neighborhood that should be done soon. To answer your question, the pieces do line up when viewed from the center of the mural standing on the north side of the tracks (see attached photo). I wanted to find a way to fill the whole space so the upper tier is a bobcat on the mesa sneaking up on the baby quail with their mother about to pitch some dynamite at it. It makes it a bit confusing as you walk around it... But those were the walls I had to work with. Hope that answers your question!

Joe

Update (November 5, 2018): Today's Cactus Catz blog entry has more photos: Monday Mural : Joe Pagac’s Borderlands Brewery mural, Tucson, Arizona.

Update (February 17, 2022): BG Boyd Photography, which specializes in photos from drones, sent this panoramic aerial view:

(The building wall has two flat parts angled, as you can see in the first photo. There's also a small section of wall above, set back a ways. The whole mural appears curved in the panorama.) Thanks as always, BG!

Rock Martinez at 6th & Toole

Rock Martinez is one of Tucson's best-known muralists. Nicole Hennig caught him on video, using Periscope, repainting one of the panels next to the 6th Street underpass from Toole Avenue. Periscope encourages vertical videos, so most of this frame (on YouTube) is black:



You can see some of the Periscope chatter and hear Nicole replying to subscribers.

I rode my bike to get a closeup on Sunday the 4th — three days ago.

I'll put a photo of the finished mural online ASAP!

Fourth annual Park Place Chalk Art Festival

The fourth annual Park Place Chalk Art Festival was this past weekend, March 31 & April 1. I stopped by to take photos and videos around 8 or 9 am on Monday the 2nd. Here's the sign (in chalk, of course) in front of the north central mall entrance:

And a map with artists' names (as always, you can click on an image for a larger view):

There were two kid zones (shown in yellow on the map above): one at the westernmost end of the mall, and one along the northeast entrance to the mall (which had rows of murals on both sides of the walkway).

Let's start at the west end:

Two videos of this end:


westernmost Kid Zone (by Katie Cooper)


westernmost Kid Zone (by Katie Cooper)

On to the northeast mall entrance:

And two videos:


Kid Zone on west side of northeast mall entrance (by Meghan Minke)


Kid Zone on east side of northeast mall entrance (by Meghan Minke)

You can see these videos in larger sizes, and more videos, on the TucsonArtInfo YouTube channel.

Between the two Kid Zones were the murals by professional artists. Here they are, from west to east.

Holly Schineller

Carolyn Watson Dubisch

Victor Manuel Navarro-Sandoval

Ruben Moreno

Martín Quintanilla

Jose Ignacio Garcia

Matt Cotten

Marisa Salazar

(Sorry, didn't do my usual editing to straighten them. I did try to fix the blue color on murals in the shade.)

Thanks to SAACA for organizing. I can't wait for next year!

Joe Pagac finishing Borderlands Brewing mural

The Tucson muralist tweeted Sunday night from @JoePagac that he'd almost finished a new mural on the side of Borderlands next to the tracks:

Finishing up at Borderlands Brewery! pic.twitter.com/ZJH6TQgRt8

— JoePagac (@JoePagac) March 30, 2015

Now @borderlandsbeer has tweeted a photo of the finished mural. It's not a very good photo, so — for now — I'll let you click there to see it on Twitter. (Or stop by in person! It's on the wall next to where 7th Avenue crosses the tracks.) I have photos of the mural in progress; I'll post them, and a photo of the finished mural, sometime in the next month or so.

If you'd like to see what was there before, have a look at Behind Borderlands.

Update (April 22, 2015): On April 10th, we showed the finished mural. I've set that link to open in a new window or tab on your browser to (I hope!) help you compare the finished mural to the photos below of the mural in progress on February 27th. First, the mural overall... then shots of the left and right ends:

I didn't do my usual careful editing, but I think you can still see which parts Joe did first as you compare the photos to the ones from April.