Murals: An Unhurried Dab In Brownsville...

 

By EDUARDO PAZ-MARTINEZ

BROWNSVILLE, Texas | Every other beer, or so it seems, this always-striving city throws out a bit of its history, its culture onto murals that arrive, but then quickly depart. You might say it is the Murals Capital of The Rio Grande Valley, although perhaps only because cities and towns in the rest of the valley hardly bother with street art.

But don't place Brownsville anywhere in California's class. Not yet.

Glitzy Los Angeles has hundreds of murals, as does San Francisco. Brownsville is in the Corpus Christi class, another Texas city that occasionally takes to painting in the wind. They're noticeable as street art deserving of a much better fate here, yet they fade, all-too-often because of what the French call ennui - ambivalence, indifference. If they are not criticized almost immediately, they are ignored. That's the current state of mural painting in Brownsville, a city of between 180,000 and 240,000 hardscrabble residents. Perhaps they have more pressing issues.

They do, of course.

It takes some interest to, say, see and enjoy a mural of Kobe Bryant or rocker Jim Morrison in Los Angeles, or one of guitarist Carlos Santana in San Francisco. Maybe if some local muralist ventured into local politics, perhaps working one up of new Mayor John Cowen and his glowing pate. Or maybe a mural denoting bad policing in town, a constant complaint. Something colorful with a distinctive editorial bent, yes.

To date, it has been butterflies and a stab at one or two murals depicting cop murder-victim George Floyd. Only, well, those were defaced soon after they saw light. Would a mural of imprisoned former schoolboard Trustee Sylvia Adkinson find an audience? We say, yes, as would a painting of the border outlaw Juan N. Cortina. Something like an angry Cortina mounted on an even angrier horse as they run roughshod across downtown streets.

Ideas and possibilities are endless if city folks grant a bit of creative license to these artists.

I suspect that there are some limitations imposed, not that you'd not want to discuss a project.

Los Angeles also counts murals depicting Texan Tejano star Selena. Why not Selena in Brownsville? Neighboring San Benito pasted a painting of rocker Freddy Fender (real name: Baldemar Huerta) on a water tower.

Murals say much about a community. In California, the Hispanic community has used murals to exhibit pride and disappointment. The effort is noticeable, the over-sized work is primo and the result is one enjoyed by the entire city for more than just a week. Murals in L.A. date back to the 1940s.

McAllen, as far as I know, has one mural. It depicts the struggle of local Mexican-Americans and it is located on a very old building along 17th Street, a byway once referred to as the Main Street for Mexicans in The City of Palms.

Harlingen may have its own murals, but I've never seen one in that city, and that mid-valley community rarely shows-off its Mexican roots. It should do it.

Next time, Brownsville considers a new mural, it should authorize a big one, like perhaps an entire wall of the old, multi-story El Jardin Hotel, which we're told is being renovated.

Art?

Yes, that would be Art.

But it would also be a major statement in support of Art...

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[Editor's Note:...The murals you see in photos above are all in California. We await Brownsville's next one and will spotlight it. Journalist Hilda Sanchez reported from East Los Angeles. Also contributing was Erasmo Ferlinghetti from San Francisco...]