Some of the older residents of Boyle Heights are critical of “illegal” vendors and unleashed dogs seen in this piece. LAPD isn’t too fond of an image of a man with his hands raised next to a taco truck with a patrol officer standing near by.
Is it a another graph mural waiting to be white washed mysteriously? Not this time. The Times reports on the Boyle Heights community reaction to the $195,000 100-foot tile mural for LAPD’s new Hollenbeck station by artist Sandow Birk .
Birk based his idea for the mural on Diego Rivera's work "Dream of a Sunday Afternoon in Alameda Park." He included a skeletal character from that mural in the Boyle Heights mural; a woman selling items in her yard in Birk's mural was based on a famous Rivera painting of an indigenous woman selling armfuls of flowers in the street.
Both women had tightly woven braids. But even that image has become controversial.
I personally took offense that all the women are overweight -- and with braids," said Teresa Marquez during the meeting, to laughter and applause. "I haven't had braids since I was 5 years old!
Councilman Jose Huizar briefly attended the meeting, but left early for another event. His aides told the residents that "this mural is not something the councilman wants" and that its installation is "stalled.
If it makes the artist feel any better; "Dream of a Sunday Afternoon in the Central
Alameda," painted by Diego Rivera ten years before he died in 1957, is now considered a
masterpiece. That mural also had it’s controversy when the avowed
atheist and Communist artist, Rivera, painted a small scroll reads
''God does not exist.''
Demonstrators gathered at the mural site and damaged the fresco. Rivera repaired it. Then a year before his death he changed the wording on the scroll to document the moment a Mexican politician had first made the quote about the non-existence of God.
Birk himself is a excellent artist who often uses themes of urban conflict, politics and pop culture. Thankfully, this current work is in tile so no slashing of the fresco is expected.
Mural sparks outcry from residents of L.A.'s Eastside [view] + photo gallery
Full shot of "Dream of a Sunday Afternoon in the Central
Alameda” [view]
Artist's website [view]
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