Two new murals have materialized in Santa Cruz to swell the ranks of the officially blessed public imagery that bejewels the streetscape. The real sparkler is almost hidden on the far wall of the parking lot at 1111 Soquel Avenue. This half-block-long untitled work is a riot of 3,224 individually designed glass mosaic squares. Integrating this disparate collection of imagery is a strong overall design using a limited but vivid palette of black, white, red and blue grout to create dynamic interplay of cubist shapes.
The individual squares, created by students in local schools, provide a glittering catalog of youthful preoccupations. Radiating suns, cats, hearts, crosses and flowers twinkle in colored glass as if Fabergé had produced an edition of notebook doodles. But many of the unsigned works are individualistic and impressive. There is no doubt that these 3,000-plus children will eventually bring their own children to see the magical square they made in school.
Marvin Plummer painted the new mural on the walls of Jazz Alley, on Birch Lane just off Pacific Avenue. His loosely brushed portraits of five jazz idols are painted in sepia tones united by carmine red graphic elements. These artists have performed at Kuumbwa, the beloved music venue that nests, well-hidden, a half-block down the alley. As much as I love Kuumbwa, this mural seems more like a billboard for the club than an enhancement of public space—a feat accomplished successfully by other longstanding murals, like those on Center Street and in Plaza Lane by James Aschbacher, which activate the space and have real local relevance.
So, what does it matter—art is art, right? Well, in Los Angeles, which has for decades been considered the “mural capital of North America” and which has plenty of concrete wall space for great and less-than-great art, this is has become a very knotty nicety. Hundreds of breathtaking works have been left to deteriorate. Some—like the 1974 Kent Twitchell painting on the Hollywood Freeway, The Freeway Lady, depicting a beautiful silver-haired old woman with a colorful afghan—were painted over without public input. Others have been left to deteriorate due to weather or graffiti. A new ordinance is having difficulty distinguishing between advertisements, which must be maintained by their creators, and the public art that is the responsibility of the city.
Locally, at least one legendary mural painted by Eduardo Carrillo and his UCSC students in the long passageway from El Palomar to Front Street, was painted out decades ago. While Los Angeles began last month the three-year process of restoring an 80-foot mural by Siqueiros, Santa Cruz could consider the simpler restoration of this well-documented treasure. The passageway needs it. And the children of those UCSC students would be so proud.
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