Day 332: Making a mural
It came up, as a topic. And it's not as stupid as most of the other topics that came up.
I love murals. I love Diego Rivera, and Thomas Hart Benton, and most of the WPA muralists -- and the Coit Tower murals, OH, I love those -- and most large scale murals I see. Two gorgeous ones have been painted in my neighborhood, though in one mural there are almost no politics, and in the other, they're... somewhat odd? It seems to be a mural of European settlement of California, showing Californian Indians dying when exposed to the Spanish and the Americans, and their ghosts, or spirits rising up, nakedly vaporous, over the Bay going to... Heaven? Unclear.
I wish I could have these two halves make a whole, but I suspect each photo is too wide. The newstand features "The Masses", and "The Daily Worker"
One of my sister's best friends is a muralist, living in the Basque country. This apartment I am in was, in fact hers, before I sublet it from her, and then took over the lease. She's amazing, VW. I wish I had photos of some of her stuff (also, in fact, of the two neighborhood murals... I wonder if they exist online? I will look).
The mural celebrating what used to be a train station, but which no longer is:
The mural showing the odd ascent of Indian spirits:
As for me, I designed a mural in middle school which, oddly, was intended to be sort of half of a Rose Window -- that is, abstract stained glass. It was painted on a table top, so it wasn't exactly a mural. And I painted one with other teachers and students at the first school I taught at, in West Oakland. I drove past the school (which has been reopened as a KIPP school and a small public "West Oakland Middle School") and discovered that they've painted that mural out. Nice. I generally feel like what I imagine visually, I cannot convey, in paint. I can in pencil or pen and ink or colored pencils. But not paint, of any sort.
I love murals. I love Diego Rivera, and Thomas Hart Benton, and most of the WPA muralists -- and the Coit Tower murals, OH, I love those -- and most large scale murals I see. Two gorgeous ones have been painted in my neighborhood, though in one mural there are almost no politics, and in the other, they're... somewhat odd? It seems to be a mural of European settlement of California, showing Californian Indians dying when exposed to the Spanish and the Americans, and their ghosts, or spirits rising up, nakedly vaporous, over the Bay going to... Heaven? Unclear.
I wish I could have these two halves make a whole, but I suspect each photo is too wide. The newstand features "The Masses", and "The Daily Worker"
One of my sister's best friends is a muralist, living in the Basque country. This apartment I am in was, in fact hers, before I sublet it from her, and then took over the lease. She's amazing, VW. I wish I had photos of some of her stuff (also, in fact, of the two neighborhood murals... I wonder if they exist online? I will look).
The mural celebrating what used to be a train station, but which no longer is:
The mural showing the odd ascent of Indian spirits:
As for me, I designed a mural in middle school which, oddly, was intended to be sort of half of a Rose Window -- that is, abstract stained glass. It was painted on a table top, so it wasn't exactly a mural. And I painted one with other teachers and students at the first school I taught at, in West Oakland. I drove past the school (which has been reopened as a KIPP school and a small public "West Oakland Middle School") and discovered that they've painted that mural out. Nice. I generally feel like what I imagine visually, I cannot convey, in paint. I can in pencil or pen and ink or colored pencils. But not paint, of any sort.