Even more art at El Rio on Speedway!

If you haven't seen our blog entries from May 02, 2008 and January 23, 2012, they'll give you a good introduction to the great murals at this Community Center. But, in a visit on November 12, 2016, I found more murals. This is another in my series of almost-lost mural photos…

I'll (uncharacteristically :) let the murals speak for themselves:

Update (September 20, 2024): The murals have been refreshed or replaced in the past five years. Today's post, Another walk around El Rio Neighborhood Center, shows all of the murals I photographed in July 2024. (I didn't get any murals inside.)

(Not) Mural Lovers, part 4: One of Tucson's largest ruined

I remember the days when taggers didn't trash murals. It's so sad that these animals seem to be spraying their hatred (or fear?) onto the art that almost all of us (not including the taggers) love.

Tucson News Now reported on Friday: Artist to repair twice-tagged mural. This is Joe Pagac's huge mural on Stone just north of 6th. You can see the first tagging in our July 2, 2017 entry !*?%&#= TAGGERS!!.

Joe originally covered the mural with a clear protective coat, but it'll apparently still take him 8-12 hours to repair the tags.

Making the Himmel library more inviting

Next in our series of almost-lost murals…

It was November 11, 2016. I'd read about the neighborhood-sponsored beautification of the Himmel Park library, so I stopped by with my camera.

One of the changes was the new bicycle rack outside the front door, which is topped by signs lettered with bicycle chains — such as “STUD.” (At least I thought that's what it said. Actually, I just now zoomed in on the photo. I can see that there's a “Y” at the end, made with a much darker piece of chain. What a shame. :)

Out front are mosaic-topped benches:

Here are close-ups of the bench tops:

Why not fifth-anniversary photos?

Every time my inbox begins to fill with mural (and mailbox art) photos, I double-check to be sure I've put each photo online before I delete the email that had the photo. So, back in December, I was surprised to see a message from Mark Fleming that he'd sent to Randy Garsee, this blog's founder. Randy sent it on to me that same day — February 25, 2013. My email program shows that I replied to Randy right away. But I don't remember ever posting these murals. (Mea culpa! Still, it can be tough to keep track of well over 1,000 murals.)

Anyway, I decided to wait for the five-year delay between Mark sending the photos and them going online. Somehow it didn't feel urgent to rush them online a month or two earlier. Still, I'm sorry for the long delay, Mark.

It was back on November 22, 2014 that I spotted Rock "Cyfi" Martinez’ mural on the north side of BreakOut Studios, 828 North Stone:

But, unlike Mark Fleming, I didn't check the alley behind the building.

I'm not sure that I got all of the photos? So I'll post them in the order that Mark sent them. The first two seem to be side-by-side, but I'm not sure about the third.

Mark wrote that the murals seem to be “by Alex Devowon and someone named 'oddeven'.”

Update (February 23, 2018): Thanks to ArtLoungeProductions (@artloungetuc on Twitter) for helping me find that BreakOut Studios has moved to East Speedway. Their website is breakoutstudiostucson.com and their Twitter feed is @BreakOutStudios. I'll have to stop by and check for new murals!

Murals being (not quite) made, Part 30c

I've been working through every one of my photos taken since early 2016. Along the way, I found some mural photos that haven't been posted to this blog yet. I showed the first of them on January 26; I'll show the rest in the next few blog entries.

I've been waiting for this mural. I first found it on March 7, 2015, as artist Jason Cross was painting what would turn out to be one of at least two or three versions. That first blog entry is Murals being made, part 30a; I posted it on November 9, 2015.

I drive by the wall from time to time. As it turned out, on November 8, 2015 — just the day before Part 30a was scheduled to be posted — I noticed some changes. So I took photos and posted them a week later, on November 16, as Murals being made (not finished), part 30b. Here's the last photo from that blog entry:

Next, two photos of the middle and the right end being changed (I think!) on May 2, 2016. The colors aren't very accurate:

Since then, I've driven by and haven't noticed any obvious changes except that the north (right) end is completely different from the version I showed above. So I decided to add this blog entry, Part 30c. Here's the photo of the right end that I took on October 25, 2016:

I haven't noticed any changes in nearly a year and a half since then. A lot of the mural elements have white space between them and the background. Maybe the artist is planning more changes, too? If I do spot any obvious changes as I drive by at 35 mph, I'll add Part 30d.

Update (March, 2019): Last month, on a stormy February 3rd, I drove along this familiar part of Alvernon and noticed that the mural was no more. You can see what's (probably) the end of the story in Murals being (un-)made, Part 30d.

Murals being made, even more (part 39, continued)

On October 3, 2016, I posted photos of a new mural on walls around a Tucson Electric Power substation. Here's one:

At the time I wrote that, the mural didn't seem finished. But I never went back to check (or to see another mural that another artist had painted at Valley of the Moon). Last week, a friend sent me photos of part of the TEP mural. Hers show the mural looking finished. I've mixed them into the original blog entry. Now the revised blog entry shows the progress:

Murals being made, part 39: TEP south of Cushing

South Tucson Fire Dept.

Viewed from E. 27th St. between S. 5th and S. 6th Avenues on Jan. 1, 2018.  Artist(s) are unknown.

Statue and Mosaic Sign

Click for a larger and sharper image.

Las Artes

On Sept 3, 2011 Jerry Peek posted photos of mosaics at the Las Artes Learning Center.  His last photo shows empty spaces on the north wall.  See Las Artes under construction.  Here are the completed mosaics that I found on Dec. 28, 2017:

Las Artes is the Pima County Arts & Education Center for ages 17-22.  It prepares students for their GED and builds employment skills through art projects.

Click on any photo for a slideshow of larger and sharper images.

Art in an alley: 2016 and 2013

I just discovered some mural photos I took on November 13, 2016. (I'm trying to organize all of my photos, not just the murals: It's frustrating because I've had lots of computer problems, backups I can't restore, multiple copies of some photos… ah, sigh, the problems of art-lovers.) Anyway, I was at the corner of Railroad Avenue and 15th Street when I looked northeast and saw a garage wall:

The base of the saguaro — actually, the whole mural — has painted rocks and real rocks:

While I'm out on my bicycle or in my car, if I come across a mural when I wasn't looking for one, I'll usually send myself an email message from my phone. My phone (unhelpfully) auto-corrected the location of this mural, but I didn't notice until now. So I went hunting with Geotagger and Google Maps to find the spot. Then I went to Google Street View and found a view from April, 2013:



At the bottom left is a trash container that looks like the same concept as ones that were painted more recently in cooperation with the City and the Tucson Arts Brigade. The garage wall design is different, though.

Update (February 16, 2018): This series of nearly-lost photos resumes with today's entry.

New on North Stone

I drive along North Stone fairly often, so I know most of the (many!) murals by heart. But, as I drove southbound from Glenn on October 7, 2017, I saw something new:

Here's the artist's signature on the bottom-left corner:

Black Bear Diner

The Black Bear Diner replaced Coco's in Aug. of 2017.  I found this mural on the east exterior wall on 12/04/2017:

Click on the photo for a larger and sharper image.

Desert Museum stingray mural

Joe Pagac painted this mural at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum, and Mark Fleming took photos on December 7th, 2017:

A kind Tucson tradition

I'd like to close 2017 with photos of special Tucson murals, “bells” awarded to especially kind Tucsonans — and more. You've probably heard of Ben's Bells. In case you haven't,or you'd like to know, the Ben's Bells home page tells their story. Or you can go straight to photos of their murals pages.

(The photo is from our April 28, 2014 entry Ben's Bells at Starr Center.)

A kind 2018 from The Tucson Murals Project!

More holiday food?!

If you haven't had enough holiday fare, how about donuts? :-P I just searched online with Bing for Amy's Donuts Tucson and found lots of rave reviews for a donut shop open 24/7, packed with people at 10 pm. 'Nuf said? (I'm not sure if they'll be open on Christmas, so you might want to stock up ahead of time…)

They also have a scrumptious mural on the east side of their (extremely-brightly decorated) building: donuts floating over Tucson. Let's chow down on the whole mural and two closeups:

Yum!

Look out!

Back on May 15th, we showed a photo of a mural titled "Look out for each other". Since then, Kikie Wilkins has sent in a photo of another mural included on the right-hand (west) side of Rock Martinez’ mural:

I'm pretty sure the BMX rider, in front of the big letters PERAZA, is Kevin Peraza of Tucson. (I found that info online on the G-Form website.) He's doing some (to me, at least) pretty amazing riding — which led to my takeoff of Rock's mural title.

I stopped by on November 6th to get closer photos:

Mosaics on Oracle

I found both of these mosaics in the median on N. Oracle Rd. between W. Adams St. and W. Lee St.
The artist(s) will have to remain anonymous.

Click on either photo for larger and sharper images of both.

Kip's; no, Vip's; no, ??'s Big Boy on Steinfeld warehouse

When I saw Mark Fleming's emailed photo from May 27th, I recognized the iconic Vip's Big Boy restaurant statue with a hamburger on his upstretched arm. (Do you remember that?) Then I noticed Mark had named it Kip's. That led me to a Wikipedia article about a (formerly) big restaurant chain — well, multiple chains — in the section of a long article named Roster of named franchisees. (There's a lot more, like the way to make different burgers and how the statue evolved, which you can see by scrolling that page up.) But I digress… :)

The mural is pasted onto the wall. There were lots more (earlier) paste-ups at the end of our October 30, 2014 entry Steinfeld Warehouse revisited (and re-energized).

Much better photos of Joe Pagac's underwater mural

Around the month we posted A few bold underwater human and alien fish (?) in mid-2016, a lot was changing on the mural hotspot of 191 East Toole Avenue. (If you haven't been there, it's worth a trip: There are murals on all but one side — and along Toole bordering the parking lot. Cross the tracks along 6th Avenue to see the building's north side.)

That blog entry has a couple of photos of a then-new mural by Joe Pagac:

That's an edited versions of one of Mark Fleming’s May 27, 2017 photos. There are more below.

The humans are holding clown fish, and their hair looks like sea anemone. It's a typically clever Joe Pagac mural. See the ramp at the left bottom, with some stuff along it? The buckets and cans could be for Joe's paint, and the ramp might be for him to reach part of the mural — though I think he finished the mural more than a year before Mark snapped these photos.

Now, as we take a look at detailed photos, take a look at a clever part:

What's at the end of the ramp? I don't mean the security lamps. If you don't see it yet, look just under the fish's mouth: That's a door handle, attached to the door:

The only reason I noticed it, as I shot my photos from far away, was that the door opened as someone was waiting to go inside. (I may have lost that photo, but I'll watch for it.)

Let's wrap this up with more closeups from left to right:

When David Aber spotted this blog entry, he wrote a couple of notes and sent links to two news articles:

1. The mural is titled "Harboring Beauty" and 2. Joe paid homeless men and women to pose for the mural.

Both stories below include photos and stories of other Pagac murals:

Local muralist paints Tucson brighter

The Man Behind the Mural: Joe Pagac

Thanks for those tips, David!

More of Mark's great photos next time.

Update (December 9, 2017): I found my photos of the opened door at the end of the ramp (circled in red above). Here's the best of them. I didn't catch the person walking in, but you can see that the door is open.

I took the photo on June 13, 2017.

Update (November 19, 2018): Today's Cactus Catz blog entry has more photos and info: Mural : Joe Pagac’s Harboring Beauty.