great walls, vibrant voices.

• Author: Wyels, Joyce Gregory

THROUGHOUT DIVERSE NEIGHBORHOODS OF LOS ANGELES, PUBLIC SPACES ARE CANVASES FOR BOLD MURALS REFLECTING ETHNIC PRIDE AND CULTURAL IDENTITY

Los Angeles, California--purveyor of pop culture, incubator of trends, entertainment epicenter--has appropriated yet another title: The Mural Capital of the World.

More than fifteen hundred murals enliven walls in shopping and entertainment districts, barrios, and beach towns, interpreting past, present, and idealized future in colors both dazzling and faded by the L.A. sun. Eastside, Westside, from the valleys to Long Beach, bigger-than-life Hollywood celebrities stare from high-rise buildings; whales swim endlessly through beachside seascapes; pre-Columbian symbols conjure ancient rituals; and Che Guevara declares, "We are not a minority!"

Though the city enjoys a growing reputation as a fine arts center, L.A.'s multitude of murals owes little to new museums and crowd-pleasing exhibitions. Rather, they spring from another source: the people whose voice is rarely heard, the ordinary folk who seldom see themselves represented in museum collections. Robin Dunitz, author of Street Gallery: A Guide to 1000 Los Angeles Murals, says that every Los Angeles neighborhood has its murals, though some are more accessible than others. Beverly Hills tends to keep its indoors.

Not so East Los Angeles, where murals are meant to be seen, and where grassroots energy transforms housing projects, schools, markets, and garages into an enormous outdoor gallery. A drive down any major street in this Latin American enclave turns up scenes of Aztec warriors and Mexican revolutionaries, civil rights leaders and religious icons, and poignant memorials to youths killed in gang violence.

It was the vibrant Chicano murals of East L.A. that first marked Los Angeles as a center of the art form that predates history. Wall paintings recall the government WPA (Works Project Administration) murals of the 1930s, the frescoes of Italian Renaissance masters, and ultimately, if one goes back far enough, drawings of hunters and prey in prehistoric caves. The civil rights movement of the 1960s and 1970s provided the impetus for Chicano murals. Influenced by the Black Power movement, student activists joined farmworkers, urban laborers, and indigenous leaders in a search for cultural identity. In the tradition of the great Mexican muralists, outdoor art became a vehicle for communication and education, and public murals became a community affair, with whole neighborhoods involved in their execution.

Drawing inspiration from the powerful murals of Diego Rivera, Jose Clemente Orozco, and David Alfaro Siqueiros, Chicano muralists adopted mythic Mexican symbols to evoke cultural pride. Like Los Tres Grandes, they eschewed subtlety in favor of bold colors and strong images. But although the Chicano mural movement had its roots in the celebrated Mexican murals, like so many imported traditions, it has taken on a peculiarly Southern California flavor. For one thing, notes art historian Marcos Sanchez, "In Mexico, Siqueiros and Orozco and Rivera painted murals in sanctioned interior spaces. Even if it was an enclosed courtyard, they were always protected. But Chicano murals go up on the sides of bakeries and stores, in alleys, housing projects--places that have very little social status."

In 1930 Orozco painted a powerful Prometheus indoors at Pomona College in nearby Claremont, adhering to the Mexican tradition. But Siqueiros took a different tack, painting his 1932 America Tropical outside, overlooking Olvera Street. His use of a "team" approach also foreshadowed the later Chicano murals. Irate sponsors whitewashed Siqueiros's painting for its implicit attack on capitalism. However, several other murals from the Depression era, mostly noncontroversial historical landscapes, still decorate Los Angeles schools and post offices.

One of the early venues for Chicano murals was Estrada Courts, a housing development in East Los Angeles. Invited to paint a few murals there in 1974, Charles "Gato" Felix enlisted the help of fellow artists as well as gang members and other youth. The crew embarked on a project that was to flourish for five years, creating no less than fifty exuberant murals and drawing international attention. Early innovators included David...