Jun. 21, 2006 - Issue #557: Art Bar

Paint me! Paint me!

A report on Mexico City Mural conference

The scene could not have been better: a leafy suburb in southern Mexico City in the middle of May; songbirds relaxing on the high, vine encrusted walls of a typically Mexican-style courtyard, as lush trees spread out overhead.

The salon just off the garden is filled with dozens of artists from around the world; talking, eating and drinking, and taking in presentations on topics on everything from “The Chicano Mural Movement in Los Angeles” to “The Artist and Community in Post-Apartheid South Africa.”

In the midst of it all, a guy with snakeskin boots and a motorcycle jacket walks right up to me and says in a booming voice and Quebecois accent, “Tabernacle! I don’t give a shit about all this social justice crap. When are we gonna talk about something really important, like paint?!”

This was the inaugural International Mural Art Conference, entitled “Mural Painting in the 21st Century,” which brought together over 150 people from around the world, united by a common interest in painting big pictures on big walls.

I have been interested in mural art for some time, doing work with school groups and community organizations in Alberta, as well as taking on as many mural commissions as I can find.

I am interested in making art a part of public space, in making the places where we live look better and more interesting. So when I heard about the conference, I jumped at the chance to spend a week with like-minded people exploring the history and future of mural art.

Jointly organized by the Diego Rivera Foundation in Mexico City and the Philadelphia Murals Arts Program in the United States, the conference brought together participants—including artists, critics, and academics—from literally all over the world, including a number of well known personalities from Mexico.

The head of the Rivera Foundation itself is none other than the daughter of Diego Rivera, the great Mexican mural artist and husband of Frida Kahlo. Guadalupe Rivera Marin is a 70-something retired law professor and writer, graceful and charming with that old kind of sophistication you find in places like Mexico City. It was wonderful to meet her and feel that connection with the legendary master, toasting her father at the final fiesta over some fine Guadalajara tequila.

One of her sons, Diego’s grandson, is a man in his 50s who looks uncannily like Diego Rivera, with his bulging eyes and stout build—a resemblance that became even more apparent as the night (and the tequila) wore on.

Though held at an arts centre in Coyoacan, a short distance from Frida Kahlo’s famous Blue House, most attendees stayed in the Centro Historico, close to the Zocala, the old heart of Mexico. A walking tour of the area took us to some of the greatest murals in the world.

It was in Mexico City in the early part of the 20th century that the Mexican mural movement began with the government-sponsored murals of Rivera, David Siquieros and Juan Orozco. These murals, often painted in new public buildings, illustrated the history of the Mexican people and reflected upon the recent revolution—pictures that helped forge a new sense of national identity in an age before television.

These were the beginnings of a movement in popular art that later spread throughout the globe, with notable community mural movements in places like the San Francisco, Chicago and Berlin.

A significant part of the conference was an attempt to look back at this history and enunciate its lineage. To this end there were presentations on the African-American mural movement in the 1960s and ‘70s in the US. There were discussions of the Sandinista murals of Nicaragua and the murals of revolutionary El Salvador.

I learned about the Philadelphia Murals Arts Program—an organization that started as an anti-graffiti public works project and has now blossomed into the largest community mural organization in the US, if not the world.

But more than simply looking back, the conference also attempted to examine contemporary mural art. What place does this form of public art-making have in modern culture? In a world where public space is so often eaten up by commercial interests and we are inundated with computer driven visual advertising, what space can hand-crafted mural art have?

There are a great diversity of mural artists, not only people working in different kinds of media (brush, spray, etc) but also people whose interests are not necessarily community based—Norman Rockwells of the mural world, whose specialty in high realism and historical small town revival murals can make them a fortune.

I learned of a guy out of France named Gilbert Coudene who does beautiful, big budget trompe d’oeil mega murals on the sides of tenement buildings in immigrant communities that defy typical description in terms of their execution (the use of LED lights) and even how they are financed (through public-private partnerships.) These artists are interested in adding colour and interest to public space. Sometimes they want to say something, other times they act largely as craftspeople hired for some commercial end.

Looking at the images of mural work from around the globe caused me to reflect more seriously on public space back in Canada. For what is arguably one of the wealthiest jurisdictions in the world, the towns and cities of Alberta are architecturally amongst the ugliest and most banal. Gateway Boulevard is bad, sure, but a place that mirrors a thousand other places where the underlying mentality is that of a gold rush.The publicly funded art projects around Edmonton, supposedly intended to beautify the public space seem so limpid compared to the possibilities that are explored elsewhere.

All in all, the fellow artists that I met were so generous with themselves and their time, and the real benefit came in moments relaxing between sessions, eating and drinking. One of my favourite memories was showing a fellow artist some of my work at the bar, feeling a little nervous in his presence until he turned to the waiter and began ordering beer by the half dozen.

It was interesting for me to see what was happening in the rest of the world in a field that is not well known in Canada. I came back with a feeling of connection with other artists who face similar struggles, tackle similar problems and who are truly extraordinary individuals.

There are plans for an even larger conference in Mexico City next year. I’ll be there. V

More stories in front »

New comments for this entry have been turned off and any existing ones are hidden. We apologize for any inconvenience.