Barrio Centro Neighborhood Mural

Bario Centro Community Mural 2011

2011-12-02T13:33:00.001-08:00


Barrio Centro Neighborhood Mural, 2011 © 2011, Tucson Arts Brigade, Images by Bob Torrez

Barrio Centro Mural Celebration!

2011-07-07T23:43:00.000-07:00

More than 175 people joined The Barrio Centro Association and Tucson Arts Brigade to celebrate the unveiling of a mural reflecting memories of the neighborhood from Saturday, June 18, at Lucky Wishbone, 2721 E. 22nd St.

Watch a portion of the 176 foot long mural being unveiled!

The mural results from a year-long series of workshops to engage local youth in positive neighborhood beautification.

Rose and her sister with Tempest

Tucson Arts Brigade Board Member Melissa Black & German Quiroga Chairman of Barrio Centro

The celebration included an opening invocation by Tucson Arts Brigade Board Member Melissa Black. German Quiroga Chairman of Barrio Centro was our MC, and many spoke including Ruben Reyes, District Director Congressman Raul M. Grijalva- AZ7, Josh Jacobsen, Lucky Wishbone, Tucson Vice Mayor Richard Fimbres, Howenstine Magnet High School Art Teacher Tempest Alabi-Isama, State Representative Daniel Patterson, Students and others. Everyone spoke of the power of community murals to unite people, and bring neighborhood stories and voices to life.

This was followed by a great dance interpretation of the mural by the TAB Dance Troupe. (We will post a video once available.) The rest of the night we danced to the music of Trio Central, playing Latin Jazz and Serenata, playing Ranchera and Bolleros.

This fall the Tucson Arts Brigade and Barrio Centro Association continue their collaboration with plans for a new mural on 22nd Street!

Celebrate, Beautify and Unify Tucson! Barrio Centro Community Mural Unveiling

2011-06-07T22:02:00.000-07:00

The Barrio Centro Association and Tucson Arts Brigade invite the entire community to celebrate the unveiling of the Barrio Centro Community Mural on Saturday, June 18th from 6:30 - 8:30 pm at Lucky Wishbone, 2712 E. 22nd Street. Join us for this free, fun-filled family event with food, music, speakers and performances.

Trio Centrál will be playing Latin Jazz and Serenata will be playing Ranchera and Bolleros.

The Barrio Centro Community Mural Project is sponsored by the Tucson Arts Brigade and is the latest release of the Tucson Mural Arts Program. This beautiful and colorful mural depicts the stories and memories of Barrio Centro neighbors that were gathered over the past year and a half.

Many scenes of neighborhood social life and history including music, baseball and the railroad are on a cement block wall that spans 176 feet long, and varies in height from 4 to 6 feet.

A mural planning and design team included Barrio Centro area residents, Howenstine Magnet High School students and their art teacher, Tempest Alabi-Isama, and Josh Jacobsen, owner of the Lucky Wishbone restaurant who worked with Michael Schwartz, Executive Director of the Tucson Arts Brigade and Lead Artist/Educator in a year-long series of workshops that included presentations, field trips and lessons on mural making and history.

“This mural reinforces our commonalities,” said German Quiroga, President of the Barrio Centro Association. The workshops included Elder Shares, meetings, and Community Paint Days which involved more than 100 neighborhood residents, and created a sense of pride, ownership, and a personal connection to the mural.

“Graffiti abatement has always been one of our goals and it is my belief that we as a community must engage our youth in worthwhile activities to steer them away from non-productive ones. Each life we touch makes our community a better place,” said Quiroga.

The Barrio Centro Community Mural Project has been a great way to engage local youth in a positive neighborhood beautification project that can be admired by all of Tucson.

This Project is part of a new Tucson Arts Brigade anti-tagging initiative entitled “Beautify and Unify” that offers arts based solutions to pressing community needs.

Funding for this project was provided by Tucson-Pima Arts Council (TPAC)/Kresge Arts in Tucson, Pro Neighborhoods, Union Pacific Foundation, Lucky Wishbone, Tucson Arts Brigade and Barrio Centro Association.

For more information, visit: www.TucsonArtsBrigade.org

Economic Literacy and Community Murals

2011-05-15T23:46:00.000-07:00

Economic Literacy isn’t the most exciting subject on the planet, and you might wonder what it has to do with community art. The bottom line is that either we learn to control our finances, or they will control us. Most of the work of Tucson Arts Brigade is in areas where poverty is a stress factor, and a barrier to comfortably developing one’s creative voice. For that reason we felt it important to incorporate economic literacy into our overall curriculum.

For this project we were fortunate enough (thanks to Kresge in Tucson/Tucson Pima Arts Council, Pro Neighborhoods, Union Pacific and members of the Tucson Arts Brigade) to be able to provide stipends for 13 youth. We broke the news to them late in the project to insure cash wasn’t an incentive, rather a reward for putting in well over 100 hours of community service.

In a moment of synchronicity Evelyn Madrid of the Bank of America had recently contacted TAB. We were able to arrange a training complete with gifts. It was a great training covering the basics of creating a basic budget, savings and checking accounts.

There are a variety of resources available for people seeing financial literacy training opportunities the Jump Start Coalition and the National Endowment for Financial Education and locally at Hughes Federal Credit Union and the Credit Wise Cats at the University of Arizona.

The youth in this project are extraordinary, and are really a beacon of hope. Part of that bright future means expanding financial learning and literacy opportunities.

More to come on the subject of economic literacy – even if it is just a tad bit boring.

Barrio Centro Mural gets more great press

2011-04-24T23:47:00.000-07:00

Check out this fantastic new video about the Barrio Centro Neighborhood Mural Project created by Luis Carrion and aired on Arizona Public Media.

Community Paint Day!

2011-04-13T14:00:00.000-07:00

Well over 75 people participated in the Barrio Centro Community Paint Day on Sat. April 2 marking a colorful start to our mural project.

Lunch time!

Paint Day was a huge success with food, music, and of course lots of paint. We were really happy to have been joined by so many neighbors and local leaders including Congressman Raul Grijalva.

Congressman Grijalva with Eddie and Angie Flores and friend.

A very busy day for our paint station experts!

We had live music all day thanks to Onofre!

Tempest cleaning brushes.

Barrio Centro Association President German Quiroga painting in Food Giant.

Mark Kerr from Ward 5 handing out certificates to youth artists.
(And he painted with us!!)

Check out our TV New Coverage: Click Here

Several news outlets covered paint day including the Arizona Daily Star, Channel 11 and 4!
You can also see a time lapse video of paint day created by Martin Linsenbigler.

Neighbors are painting every Tuesday and Friday from 3-5pm through the end of April, come join us!

Barrio Centro Association Approves Mural Design

2011-03-21T00:37:00.000-07:00

On Thursday February 17 youth presented our final mural design to the Barrio Centro Neighborhood Association. There were several suggestions for minor changes, and students were asked questions about the content and process. The design was unanimously approved.

The following week we started the process of cleaning and priming the wall. After we measured out our grid we began to transfer our design to the wall using charcoal. Over the next few weeks we will be preparing for Community Paint Day. We are inviting residents of Barrio Centro to join us as we paint in the first layers of this 176 foot long mural. There will be a planning meeting for community paint day Thursday March 24, 7pm at the Potter House.

Community Paint Day will be Saturday April 2 from 10 am - 2pm at Lucky Wishbone 2712 E. 22nd Street. Please bring a hat water bottle and sun screen, we will provide the paint, directions and refreshments.

TUCSON WAS A RAILROAD TOWN

2011-03-11T18:37:00.000-08:00

We were thrilled to have Tucson rail historian and author William D. Kalt III present to attentive neighbors, youth and staff at Howenstine High School on February 15. His presentation was fascinating and cast a new light on Tucson from 1850 to the present. He is author of a fascinating account of Tucson history entitled “Tucson Was A Rail Town” that is published by and available from VTD Rail Publishing.

“The grandson of a Tucson SP accountant, William Kalt, grew up in a proud pioneer Arizona family. History lessons began early for the career public educator, as relatives shared tales of the rough and tumble days of their youth. Smitten with stories of life in the southwest, Kalt began his studies of the SP in pursuit of family history. The quest soon evolved into a broader search for the railroad's role in Tucson during the steam era. Proficient in Spanish and imbued with a passion for history, Kalt sought out people of every heritage, who lived the glory days of steam. Capturing oral histories of Tucson 's railroad men and women, in combination with archival research across the southwest, he found deep and lasting friendships, amusing accounts, and a cherished understanding of the people who called themselves “rails.” Kalt's “I'll Meet You In the Cornfield: the Tragic Train Wreck of 1903” appeared in the winter 2004 issue of the Journal of Arizona History . That journal also ran his story, “ Epes Randolph : Railroad Man of the Southwest,” in its summer 2006 issue.” - From "Tucson Was a Railroad Town"

“This profusely illustrated history is more than just another train catlogue: it is a flesh-and-blood book about railroaders themselves. It narrates how the railroad affected the lives of its employees as well as local citizens. For example, several locomotives engineers who had lost vision in one eye could no long make regular runs, but they were allowed to keep their jobs and work the spur line that ran from Tucson to Nogales betwseen about 1910 and 1950. The book is filled with human faces and interesting stories about those who proudly served the railroad. To understand Tucson, you must know the railroad, and this book is a fascinating place to start.”- Bill Broyles.

We learned that parts of Barrio Centro and Julia Keen neighborhoods were stockyards for cattle. These yards had been closer to downtown Tucson, but residents took exception to the stench and they were moved far out of town. The second important development in early Barrio Centro history was the development of pumps powerful enough to direct water uphill, and out of Tucson to what is today Barrio Centro. The rail yards were where many original BC residents worked. It was a short walk and allowed workers to return home for lunch. On paydays workers would frequent the local pub, such as the Cactus Saloon pictured here.

Bill’s presentation really helped answer some of the pressing questions we had about early Tucson history, and the development of our city. You can see many of his influences in our mural design.

Youth Artists Prepare for the Mural design review,

with support and praise from neighborhood elders.

Mr. Kalt, a teacher for many years, spent the rest of the session working with us on the design, and prepping youth for the upcoming presentation of our design to the Barrio Centro Association.

We hope to work with him often as we learn more about the history of our area, he is truly a Tucson gem.

Bill Rose and Eddie

Chugging Along on our Mural Design

2011-01-31T16:45:00.000-08:00

We have so much to report on the progress of our mural project. We have been doing a great deal of research into the neighborhood history, and learning some great things. For example during a recent Elder Share we learned that many rail workers lived in the neighborhood. The work siren world be used by everyone to know what time it was. The rail crossings were only marked with a simple sign like the one pictured here. You had to be careful! The railroad plays a big part in the design you will see in a few weeks.

Our second Elder Share was attended by ten neighbors who shared memories about people and places in the neighborhood. As they painted a landscape of life in the area over the past 50 years it struck me how a single person or incident could dramatically alter the life and history of an area, for better or worse. Did you know that there was an artisan spring where the 22nd Street overpass now is? I loved when we found out that the 29th Street Overpass, where TAB is working on another project, was initiated by neighbor and teacher Angie Flores. She wrote a letter to the city requesting the bridge in consideration of the students safety as they crossed the busy intersection.

Onofre up for bat in Bristol Park, 1970's

We learned about numerous business from Put-Put Golf, Hasty Tastey's, Gooney Golf, Mr. Lee's Market, El Conquistador, and the Olympic size pools at Reid Park.

Sports of all types are still popular in the neighborhood.

Each week our project advances. We have been on field trips to the Arizona History Museum and visited by long time neighborhood residents.

Our most recent visitors were Eddie Flores and Ivo Ortiz. They shared some great details about
neighborhood life and history, and reviewed our design in progress. Mr. Flores reminded the students the importance of staying engaged in civic life and service projects.

We continue to develop our technical skills as well, studying some advanced color theory while adding color to the hand drawn design. The wall is over 180 feet long, so there are numerous details to consider.

Over the next few weeks we will finish our design in preparation for a Design Presentation on Thursday Feb. 17, 6pm at the Potters House 2922 E 22nd St..

Barrio Centro Elder Share

2011-01-16T20:56:00.000-08:00

On Wednesday, January 26, the Barrio Centro Mural Committee will host an elder share session at the Lucky Wishbone starting at 6:30pm.

Please encourage anyone who has lived in this neighborhood for any length of time to share their memories along with any photos or memorabilia from the neighborhood.

Barrio Centro Elder Share

Join us in sharing your stories and memories of Barrio Centro.

These ideas will be woven into our mural design.

Please bring photos, articles or anything else you might like to share.

Wednesday Jan. 26th, 6:30pm

Lucky Wishbone 2712 E. 22nd St.

Images from Arizona Historical Society

Community Tapestry Comes to Life in Barrio Centro

2010-12-22T00:20:00.000-08:00

Barrio Centro Youth Muralists Meet With Lucky Wishbone Owner Josh Jacobson

Barrio Centro is a really special place. Long time residents of the area gathered on December 4, 2010 to share stories of the neighborhood. They shared stories for hours and seemed to know almost everyone in the area. Among the many stories that are emerging are the role of little league, family picnics and movie night. These are stories of people gathering together to enjoy our great weather and good neighbors. The stories we have gathered to date start about 1939 with the buildings of the first houses. Residents bought lots from the Gifford’s family, who were well known for their generosity and good will. The stories continue through the years to the present day.

Over the past several months fourteen youth ages 14-18, neighborhood residents Howenstein art teacher Tempest Alabi-Isama and lead muralist Michael Schwartz of Tucson Arts Brigade have been developing the mural design. We sorted through and organized dozens of ideas and suggestions that have been gathered. The railroad, neighborhood social activities, airplanes, buildings and daily life are among the major themes.

It’s been really nice having residents such as Rose, Charles and German come and speak with neighborhood youth. Rose spent the last several sessions with us, helping get details such as the sheet used as a screen for neighborhood summer movies at Bristol Park.

The mural wall is 175 feet long and 5’ tall. The design is to scale and when we roll it up it looks like a scroll. It’s been a ton of work, but we are making great progress. Each workshop we add more details as well as learning artistic techniques and become more familiar with mural history.

As we draw to end of the year we have many more questions. Was there a pony express stop in the neighborhood? Where was the fist structure? Is it still there?

In the coming year we are planning more workshops, a visit to the Historical Society and more meetings with long time neighborhood residents.

Our Project has Started!

2010-11-08T15:58:00.000-08:00

After many months of preparation and careful planning mural design workshops have started every Tuesday from 3-5pm at Howenstien High School. We have a great core group of youth and more kids are coming each week.

We have been working on developing ideas for the mural , as well as reviewing the elements of art and principles of design. The design ideas we have developed are based on input gathered from neighbors over the past few months. Some of those constant themes are trains, airplanes, sports, parks and bicycles.

Last week we had our first class visit from German Quiroga, who described the neighborhood and answered students questions. In our next session we will be looking at our mural site and documenting what we see in our journals. This site vist is really a chance for kids to take a new look at their neighborhood through the eyes of an artist.

Over the coming weeks we will be creating a to scale design proposal for our mural walls. We will present our design to the Barrio Centro Association in January.

Stay tuned for more updates!

Barrio Centro Mural Neighborhood Input

2010-10-04T16:34:00.000-07:00

Diane, German and Martin
At the September neighborhood neighborhood meeting we met to brainstorm some ideas for our mural. We also set up a booth at the annual fiesta on October 2nd. The fiesta was a blast as you can see from the images. Combined we already have input from more than 30 neighbors.

Here are the voices Barrio Centro residents;

“My family is an extension of the neighborhood. What is important to us is developing community, feeling safe, knowing our neighbors, security, trees, wild life and birds, local businesses, family, picking up trash and litter, walking dogs, helping each other, watching out for each other, maintaining a safe place for kids to play, having quietness from the train noises, home, good morals, trains, children, the good appearance of the Barrio, history of the old neighborhood. Keeping with the history of Barrio Cento. Our house was built in 1939 and the house just south of us was built in the1980’s. Everyone being nice to you, and friendly.”

Sights, Smells and Sounds

Flowers, Music, Food.
Mountains, all colors, kids practicing softball, roasting chili’s at Food City, the roadrunner.
We hear trains, bicyclists, airplanes.
Trees, Carne Asada on weekends, Luck Wishbone, nice homes and yards.
Zoo Animals and Birds, traffic on 22nd Street, the smell of palm trees, mowed grass at the park and wild flowers.
Cookouts, mesquite grills around the neighborhood. Seeing fireworks.
Chinese restaurant smells,
Birds, raptors and ducks from Reid Park, Puesto’s good local restaurant.
Children playing, old time music,
The smell of rain, mariachi music, blue and red colors of the neighborhood.

Specific Ideas

Something with a train, since we live next to the main train yard.
Gather photographs of residents, with captions about each person (post to blog and/or use in the design).
Diversity of our neighborhood. I think it would be nice to have in the mural a scene which includes all the ethnic backgrounds of our neighborhood. There is a song by U2 where the lyrics read” where all the colors bleed into one”. And it seems all races in Barrio Centro seem to get along.

Rose Handing out gifts at the celebration.

Concerns

Speeding Cars, Better Grocery Store, Nose Pollution, Security, Need Street Lights.
The trains are too loud, especially when they blow the horns at 2:30am.

Tempest and the students from Howenstine HS face painting at the celebration.

Favorite Places

I like the yard of my house. I’m trying to make it look nice.
My house because my family is always there every Sunday.
My house, the Bike Paths.
Golden Phoenix
Fiesta Market – I love that there is an independent market with fresh food, beer and tortillas.
The jogging track along aviation because I like to exercising late at night.
big old trees along the bike path,
Railroad Trains
My family and yard, the trees, flowers, nature and peaceful place

TAB Table at Annual Fiesta

Bristol Park
Kids planning in park, it’s nice to see, memories of walking to the park, playing with children. I grew up playing in Bristol Park. Lots of good memories such as playing basketball, baseball and picnics. I come with my dogs to play ball. You can meet new people.

The ladies of Barrio Centro sporting new BC tees.

Reid Park
Proximity to Reid Park and the Zoo, a nice place to relax. I run 3-4 mornings a week and the park is quiet and peaceful.

The celebration included music, food, dancing and health check ups.

Historical Time Line ( in progress – we need your help!)

1939 1433 S Winmor Built

___ Eastmore Division Built

___ El Campo Estates Built

___ Bristol Park created

___ 1950’s Richie’s Drive In Opens

___ 1980’s Richie’s Drive In Closes

___ Lucky Wishbone Opens

___ Barraza/ Aviation Parkway Built – some street closures

___ Reid Park Built

Our Mural Project Starts!

2010-09-14T15:11:00.000-07:00

Thanks to everyone on the mural planning team and a recent grant from Pro-Neighborhoods our project has started! We are continuing to meet and gather ideas, images and stories. What is starting to emerge is an amazing story of life in this part of Tucson.

We are looking for more information about El Campo Estates, the Railroad, rail workers and families, boxing stars like Jonny Rico and Paco Flores. This is just the start and we are really excited to gather more information and share that with you here.

Neighborhood Fiesta
We will have a “Mural Project” table set up at the Neighborhood Fiesta in Bristol Park Saturday October 2, Noon-6pm. This is going to be a great even with food, refreshments, live entertainment, bands, clowns, youth races, bike taxi fun and friends. The theme this year revolves around Health and Wellness in the neighborhood.

At the mural booth we will be asking people to fill out a survey and share what they would like to see in neighborhood murals.

If you want you can download the survey by clicking on the image above and return it to us at the festival.

Youth Workshops Start Tuesday Oct. 19 3pm

We have scheduled our youth workshops at Howenstine High School, 555 South Tucson Boulevard on Tuesday’s 3-5pm starting Oct. 19 – Dec. 14, 2010 and then resuming Jan. 4 – March 8, 2011.

We will be working on our mural design through the fall and invite everyone to a design approval meeting on December 14. Our design will need to be approved by the neighborhood, business owners and community members. Once we have a design we all agree on we will begin the process of creating our murals. Our mural sites are Lucky Wishbone and the ReStore both on 22nd street. We are really excited to have both local businesses as partners on this project.

Water Color and Elder Share Workshops
Look forward to a neighborhood Water Color Workshop, Elder Share, Design input and approval meetings this fall. This spring we will be inviting everyone to come help paint the mural during the community paint day, and celebrate the unveiling of the murals and celebration of our collective efforts.

As always we welcome your ideas, feedback, poems, stories and images. This is your blog!

Proposed Walls for our Mural

2010-07-23T19:31:00.000-07:00

Here are the two walls we have proposed for this project - one at Lucky Wishbone, the other at the Restore. Two great local businesses on 22nd St. It was great to meet some of the business owners as we looked for walls, and invite them to join in partnership with the neighborhood over the long term, nad in the short term on this project.

Welcome to our Blog!

2010-07-13T12:48:00.001-07:00

This site will report on the Barrio Centro neighborhood Mural project. This exciting project starts in September and includes;

- after school mural arts workshops for youth ages 14-18

- neighborhood design sessions and

- long time resident/ elder shares.

Stay posted to this site to find out about workshop times and locations.

We are really jazzed about this project and want to thank all our supporters and the Mural Planning Team for all their hard work. We are currently finalizing the mural and workshop location(s). Check back soon!