Top of Tech Park

Along Kino Parkway, just south of 36th Street, are tile murals on curving walls along the edge of the (soon-to-be) UA Tech Park at The Bridges. Walking into them from the north:

Here are the sides of each wall (click for a larger view):

The credit panels are on the ends of the walls. They probably correspond to the artists who made the tiles on each wall. Unfortunately, I didn't keep track of which was where…

Nearby is a bench where you can take a break. (Click there to view it on the Tucson's Pocket Parks blog.)

My first visit here was just before August 1, 2012, when three of the murals were done. I came back on March 9, 2016.

Edge High School, part 5 of ??

After four other blog entries with art at Edge High School, here's the beginning of the end. Along the alley that parallels Speedway, just beyond the eegee's, is a long wall with one mural after another:

I'll tease you :) by not starting to show these murals for another week. Next Monday I'll post photos of some murals that weren't finished when I first posted them a year or two ago.

Edge High School, part 4 of ??

On the opposite wall of the fence we saw last time is the school's parking lot. Underneath the fence, at the western edge of the parking lot, is a mural wrapped around the corner. Here's the west side of the corner, then a closeup:

As you can see (click for a larger view), the bird is cut from plywood and painted.

Now the north side, and another closeup:

More photos from my November 6th visit next time.

Edge High School, part 3 of ??

Last time, we saw the first piece of stained glass along the front fence of this art-covered school. Here are the rest, from east to west:

Randy Garsee and I decided, years ago, to say that a “mural” is basically any art that's flat and (typically) on a wall. So, the first three blog entries in this series — well, not including the picnic table :) — may not have been murals by your definition. Next time, though, we'll get to “real” murals: paint on a wall.

I took these photos on November 6, 2015.

Computer coming back to life

I'm on the road with my laptop computer. It went into a bizarre cycle of trying to fix itself, giving up, trying to fix again, and…. I finally gave up, wiped out my programs (a.k.a. "apps"), and re-installed Windows.

So the blog may not be back to normal until I'm home early next week. Sorry about that.

Edge High School, part 2 of ??

OK, so I raved last time about all of the art around this central Tucson charter high school. Next step: I got permission from the school office to take photos and share them on this blog. So I went outside (with my cell phone camera) and went wild. :) First was the row of stained-glass murals (yes, I consider any piece of flat art as a “mural”) along the front fence.

I'll start the photos with the mural at the east end, closest to the gate. Here are the view from the south side (where the sun was then, on November 6th) and then from the north side (where the sunlight passed through the mural):

Next time: the rest of the stained glass “murals” along this amazing school's front fence.

Edge High School, part 1 of ??

This is the 1,111th entry on the Tucson Murals Project since Randy Garsee started this blog in 2006 — almost ten years ago. (To see older entries, click on one of the years in the Blog Archive at the right-hand side of this page.) I'm glad to have been able to help share some of Tucson's great art with you!

Here's a school with even more murals than our previous “muralific” school. There are so many murals around Edge High School that I'm not sure how long it will take to show you all of them. They're all thanks to (as one of the people I met in the school's office told me) a very talented art teacher and the wonderfully expressive students.

I was blown away by this great find as I tried to bicycle around the dead-end 1st Street just south of Speedway and east of Country Club on November 6, 2015. After I spotted the Ben's Bells mural on the east side of the school buildings…

…I rolled around the corner to see if there was more. Yes! Let's get started with the art I passed on the way into the school office (to ask permission to take photos). A tile-covered table out front:

(OK. That's not exactly a mural, but the rest are. Mostly. :) Like this:

Next, on the wall opposite the school's entrance, are side-by-side murals. (The sun shone into my phone's camera lens, so the photos have bright spots at the left edge.) First, the top mural:

And some detail from the bottom-right corner of the top mural:

More next time — in part 2 of who-knows-how-many?

Update (May 19, 2016): This series ended at part 10.

Faded at 12th and Park

December 21st, I was taking one of my favorite bicycle shortcuts from the west side of the Park Avenue “freeway” (south of Broadway) to the east side. As I rode along 12th Street, I spotted a faded mural on the northwest corner of Rustica, just west of Park Avenue:

Here's a closer view:

I didn't have time to go inside and ask if they know the story. If you know, please leave a comment below! (You can stay anonymous, if you'd like.)

Howling At The Moon

This mural first appeared in the Tucson Murals Project on June 16, 2011 as the Wildcat School from Warren V.  It next appeared in the Tucson Daily Photo on May 6, 2014 as the Sad piece of Tucson history. It had been completely covered by a chain link fence.  The fence is now gone.  The mural is on the west wall of the Pepe Barron Academy.  It is best viewed from behind the Eegees at Stone & Drachman.  I took this photo on Jan. 17, 2016.

Click on the photo for a larger (and sharper) view.

Mexico City is mural heaven!

Many thanks to David Aber for taking over while I spent most of February in Mexico. Since I'd only barely crossed the border in the past years to visit my dentist in Nogales (if you want a good dentist, just ask! :) my trip into central Mexico amazed me. There's street art (and other kinds of art) everywhere.

As I write from time to time: This is the Tucson Murals Project, but once in a while (such as Randy's post from Baghdad) we like to spread stories of murals around the world. Here's one from my time in Mexico — at the Garibaldi Metro (subway) stop, I think:

It shows Metro riders. The mural has more visual art around its edges, and urban/rap-type music (in Spanish, of course) plays in the background. It's typical of what I came to discover in the Mexican cities I visited: what seemed like much more appreciation for the Arts than in some places. (Let's please pull for even more Tucson art… and cooperation between artist groups and government… OK, off of my soapbox. :)

Next time, back to another of David's mural photos! I'll continue in March with an incredible number of murals at a high school I spotted while I was searching for my way out of a dead-end street.

P.S. I hope you enjoy your extra day (February 29th). How about some mural-watching? By the way, Dave is busy updating the mural map. It's one of the links you'll find on the TucsonArt.info murals page.

Natural World

Tile murals by Robin Riley (I think) and the students of Santa Clara Elementary.  I took these photos on 12/11/2015.

Click on any photo for a slide show of larger photos.
Another mural from the Santa Clara School was posted on 12/26/2011.

Conserve To Enhance

I was wandering the neighborhood on Dec. 24, 2015 looking at Christmas decorations and found this at Anna Henry Elementary School:

The school's mascot is a Gila Monster and it's painted on a 3,000 gal. rainwater recovery tank.
Click on any photo for a slide show of larger images.

Chicanos

Alley behind Tierra y Libertad Organization (TYLO), a Tucson-based grassroots neighborhood organization in Barrio Wakefield.  The alley is located in the 3600 block between South 6th and 7th Avenues.  Photo was taken on Oct. 28, 2015.

Click on the photo for a larger image.

That's actually only the left end of a long and exquisitely-painted mural. I stitched together a panorama.

There are more murals — not as long or polished as this one, but still impresssive — at IncrediblAlley.

Hummingbird Mural

The South side of a building at S. 12th Ave. and W. Lerdo Rd.  Photo taken on Dec. 11, 2015.

Click on the photo for a larger view.

Midtown Bar & Grill

Here are three photos of a mural painted on the front and side of the Midtown Bar & Grill:

Photos were taken on Dec. 11, 2015.
Click on any photo for a larger size.
NOTE:  By July 30, 2016 all of the murals have been painted over. What a shame.

Trash container murals revealed

The graffiti-abatement test program — of painting murals on five dumpsters — showed off its work Friday, February 5th in the parking lot behind the old Chicago store location (across the street from the new, much smaller location). Here's a wrapup from KVOA-TV News 4:

First 5 'dumpster art' containers completed Friday

New at Mexicayotl Academy

Around the corner from the other murals at Mexicayotl Academy (which are mostly faded now)I spotted a new mural November 20th. Here are two views:

David Aber joins the Tucson Murals Project

You've seen a number of David Aber's great photos on this blog. He's emailed them to me and I've posted them.

I realized that he might just post the photos himself — and he's agreed to become the blog's co-editor. You'll start seeing his name at the bottom of some blog entries on the "“Posted by” line.

Welcome, Dave!

Slovly('s) mural updated

Three years of Mondays ago — January 21, 2013 — I posted photos of the mural by Sabrina Vincent — better known as the artist SLOV — on the wall outside her family's Tucson home.

(If you haven't seen that blog entry, I hope you'll click over! The mural was one of my favorites. And don't miss the links from that blog entry to the Arizona Daily Star article and to the photos of the mural-making, as well as the Portfolio section, of SLOV's website.)

Yesterday, as I drove along Columbus Boulevard — on my way home from a planning meeting of the Heart of Tucson Art group — by the way, their spring artsists' open studios tour will be April 9-10 — I drove by this familiar spot. (I know Tucson streets mural-by-mural. “Such-and-such mural is two blocks over there,” I'll think.) I did a double-take and pulled over right away to take some photos.

The left side of the old mural — next to her garage door — is now solid blue-green. The new mural is on the side of her home along Columbus:

The words are: thee lift me / and I'll lift thee / and we'll ascend together.