The fall of a city's walls

A woman selling sizzling gorditas passed Ernesto de la Loza as he dabbed Liquid Shield on the cracked wall where his mural, Resurrection of the Green Planet, stretched out like a jewelled bird.

Even with the aroma of fresh food wafting by, his gaze never left the injured surface. For a quarter of a century, de la Loza, 59, has created murals in Los Angeles — 40 in all.

But this one, which adorns a convenience store on the corner of Cesar E. Chavez Avenue and Breed Street in Boyle Heights, is among only eight that still exist. The others were painted over or simply ravaged by neglect.

Now Resurrection faces a similar fate. In November, the owner of the building received a notice from the city informing him that he had 90 days to remove the graffiti defacing the 1991 mural or face a $450 fine.

Full restoration would cost between $40,000 and $50,000, a sum that neither de la Loza nor owner Raymond Ahn could afford.

So while awaiting possible assistance from the Getty and Annenberg foundations, de la Loza spent several weeks cleaning the mural himself, at a cost to Ahn of at least $5,000.

The crumbling wall and fading paint confronting the artist highlighted the derelict state of murals throughout the city.

Harsh sunlight and pounding rain corrode epidermal layers of walls, while insect infestations cause cracks that eventually fracture surfaces.

Would-be street artists use industrial-grade spray paint to claim territory, often tagging over muralists' names and wiping out their credentials. Without restoration or conservation, murals in Los Angeles could become extinct.

The process is painstaking. Some days, de la Loza could be found crouching on the sidewalk using chopsticks to lift bubbles in the paint and smooth out the worn surface.

Other days, he perched high on a ladder, meticulously applying what he called a sacrificial varnish to prevent spray paint from seeping into the walls and permanently destroying the high-grade, glossy enamel he customarily has used on his murals.

“People don't understand the value of the murals,'' he said. “It takes money to protect them — you have to service them.''
De la Loza insists that restoring Resurrection is about more than just avenging the crimes of vandals.

The mural, he said, is part of the city's rich Mexican-American history. At the centre of its 15- by 50-foot expanse, a curandera, or healer, touches the head of a young woman, whose eyes appear closed in peaceful resignation.

The rich brown of the healer's skin visually pops against the red and orange of a healing aura surrounding her.

Next to the women, a saintly figure pours spirals of blue and purple water from a horn-like vessel.

The liquid cascades into a modern scene of microscopes and laboratory instruments.

De la Loza was inspired by an atmosphere of change, one that embraced new technology but also looked to the past for reassurance. He sees Resurrection as a bridge between the old world and the new.

“People think the world stops at the border,'' he said. “But this symbolises what Chicano art is. We should be acknowledged for our contribution.''

The Social and Public Art Resource Centre, or SPARC, commissioned Resurrection in 1990 for $35,000, through a programme called Neighbourhood Pride: Great Walls.

In total, Neighbourhood Pride commissioned 105 murals throughout Los Angeles. Of those, 60 per cent have been damaged, estimates Judy Baca, an artist and co-founder of SPARC.

“I wasn't going to let this die,'' de la Loza said of his mural.

“Boyle Heights is a treasure — it has vibrancy. This is America.''

Los Angeles once was considered the mural capital of the United States, if not the world. In recent years, though, that honour has been usurped by Philadelphia, which invests $3 million a year in public art.

While Philadelphia's streets teem with kaleidoscopic colour, Los Angeles' streets are fading like a vanishing rainbow.

Adding to the deterioration of murals is the advent of graffiti. A truce once existed between artists and taggers — artists created public art without the danger of losing their work to turf-minded youth.

But the relationship has eroded as new gangs have taken to the streets, looking for any available space to mark their territory.

“Los Angeles has a history of producing works and then abandoning them,'' Baca said. “We need a value system that says destroying art is a much greater crime than vandalising a white wall.''

Baca estimates that the city would need to invest $100,000 of its $10 million annual graffiti-abatement programme to maintain murals.

With the funding, SPARC could hire small teams to assess damage and mend artworks.

Despite the city's resistance to commit such funding, SPARC recently secured an unprecedented $2.1 million from the state, the city and the Santa Monica Conservancy to fully restore the region's magnum opus, The Great Wall of Los Angeles.

City officials point to the restoration of The Great Wall as a sign that Los Angeles has not abandoned its murals.

Councilman Tom LaBonge, chairman of the Arts, Parks, Health and Ageing Committee, plans to hold a joint conference with the Planning and Land Use Committee in hopes of securing a greater percentage of the graffiti-abatement programme to restore and conserve murals.

“There is no question that there is not enough money but murals are an important part of the LA landscape,'' LaBonge said.

But de la Loza remains doubtful that, with the sagging economy, officials will give much weight to the future of murals.

For now, he is focused on finding grants to restore Resurrection. “People want to bury their heads in the sand and say it's not a problem.

But every square inch is being attacked,'' he said. “For me, it's like my image got deleted. It's like I don't exist.''