Best Mural '96

Best Mural

Truly Nolen
3620 E. Speedway

READERS' PICK: Over time, the Truly Nolen mural has evolved into an irreplaceable thread in Tucson's elaborate fabric. Upon first encountering the mural, however, one is taken aback by the sheer audacity of its execution. It seems too much: the bees, the honeycombs, the sunflowers, the sheer yellowness of it all. The building throbs and pulsates with a sort of unnatural life. Gradually, however, one assimilates the mural into his schema; it becomes a comfortable and pleasing sight. Indeed, one begins almost to anticipate its appearance on the horizon. This does not mean, however, that it should be taken for granted--mural art is as delicate and fleeting as the flowers of the night-blooming cereus. (Tucson must never forget what happened to the legendary Henry Electric mural.) One day we could awaken to find the Truly Nolen building again a plain off-white. We must celebrate the mural while it's still with us.

READERS' POLL RUNNER-UP: The Mat Bevel Institute (formerly the D.P.C.), 530 N. Stone Ave.

STAFF PICK: We're not absolutely sure the mural now circling the UA Joseph Gross Gallery building, Park Avenue and Speedway, is the best in town, but it's hands-down the most ambitious. A series of plywood panels extending as a frieze some 288 feet along the nine-sided building, the mural does no less than attempt an art historical tour of the world. All painted in super-bright, almost Day Glo colors, the panels re-create designs from every corner of the globe, including serpents from early Central America, Celtic coils from Ireland, King Tut from Egypt, Van Gogh imagery from 19th-century France. Even more admirable, the mural was made piece by piece by a team of undergraduates studying under ebullient art prof Alfred J. Quiróz. Their plywood mural won't last forever--other art projects likely will replace it in a few years' time--but it will stand as a fine university project that not only gave young students a chance to strut their stuff very publicly, but also gave traffic-bound commuters on nearby Speedway something art-worthy to help pass the gridlock time.

A PERFECT 10: The Skater, 2700 N. Stone Ave. It all started when billboard artist Jos Villabrille called up Skate Country North manager Steve Gabany and told him the roller-skating rink's paint job was out of date. Next thing you know, Villabrille was inside painting on the far wall just where the rink curves, turning out that fabulous gigantic mural of a skater breaking through bricks. Gabany liked the monumental skater so much that he hired Villabrille to do the outside Stone Avenue facade, too. The result was another mural of a skater breaking through a barrier--banners this time. Then came the Southwestern landscape full of coyotes and such along the locker wall. We're with Gabany. Every time we take our kids over to Skate Country North for one of those PTA fundraisers, we marvel at the notion of a private business taking it into its head to provide art for the masses. And whenever we teeter around that far bend, trailing those fast-flying kids, we relish the sight of the supreme skater in paint, encouraging us to go on.

A PERFECT 10: Mentioned in the book Twentieth Century Folk Art Of The Americas, Australian-born artist Leslie Grimes arrived in California in 1928, where he worked as a scenery painter at the Fox and Charlie Chaplin studios. The former wrestler painted under contract from the Clougherty Meat Packing Company in the 1960s, on their plants in L.A., Fresno, Phoenix and Tucson, thus explaining the wall of Farmer John's Meats, West Grant Road east of I-10, where the cows came home many moons ago. Most of the paint was laid on with rollers and huge brushes, and if you look at the walls just inside the plant entrance you'll notice that although the scenery continues, there is a conspicuous absence of cows.

A PERFECT 10: A stunning example of Soviet "realist" art can be found on the west wall of the Alamo Building on Sixth Street. Depicting a troika of multiracial proletarian woodworkers engaged in bringing about Marx's dream of a workers' paradise, this mural recalls both the neo-Baroque flourishes of Honore Daumier, as well as the exaggerated musculature of "Jumbo" Jack Kirby. Mention must be made of the effect of the powerful foreshortening of the bearded worker's left arm, which has led to innumerable traffic accidents by rubbernecking art lovers. While united in their appreciation of the mural's form and execution, critics vehemently disagree over the meaning of the "log" being cut by the pony-tailed woodworker, which simply fades off into nothingness at one end. Many deconstructivists claim it's a subtle jibe about the failure of all idealistic philosophies (including Communism) to live up to their true potential. Others claim the artists simply ran out of paint. Whatever the case, the debate is likely to rage for years to come.

1998 Winner: Truly Nolen
1997 Winner: Truly Nolen
1995 Winner: Truly Nolan