New mural, old art and javelina mascots

Wow! Go downtown soon to see the new rodeo mural by Ignacio Garcia. It is at 6th and Toole St. where I came upon it accidentally and can report that it is spectacular! The back of the County Justice building is the canvas for this artwork and it towers above all the other murals nearby, including the famous blue Nemo mural about a half a block away.

At the other end of downtown, at the Tucson Museum of Art I viewed some historic paintings from the Spanish colonial era of South America. While the painting techniques look European, it was interesting that the artists were often listed as “unknown artist”. I am willing to bet that “unknown artist” was an indigenous person, probably a man, whose talent was never acknowledged.

Our Lady paintings done three ways

Anyway, because in Tucson we are so familiar with Our Lady of Guadalupe images, I took photos of three versions of Our Lady painted in the 1700s in three formerly Spanish colonial cities. The image on the left is Our Lady of Guidance from Caracas, Venezuela. La Paz, Boliva is the home of the Our Lady of Remedies in the center. And on the right is Our Lady of the Rosary from the silver mining city of Potasi in Peru. (Note: This show has closed now.)

And here are some art works done by indigenous artists centuries before the Our Ladies were painted. We do not know their names, but their warrior sculptures are clear in their emotions.

Now about the Javelina Mascots…

You can read the story behind the javelina at the top of this page here. It is one of several javelinas that have been given the Adobe Firefly treatment and will be brought onto the pages of “I Saw it In Tucson” as mascots. At one point I thought about doing T-shirts and mugs and other stuff, but decided for now just to introduce these characters to readers. Let me know if you like it by clicking on Like, below. Then come back and see the next javelina a few days from now and then the next..They are a part of a large family of fictious and fun peccaries.