San Antonio is a city of murals. This is the newest mural to join the tribe. It’s called ‘The Spirit Within’.
You can find it downtown on the wall of the Market Square building on West Commerce across from Milam Park.
It portrays a jaguar eating a taco, among other things, and evokes the spirit of this place. Especially the feminine energy.
Market Square used to be the abode of the Chili Queens back in the day. In the evenings they would cook up their spicy beef chili in great big ollas and haul them downtown to serve the hungry patrons.
That was the beginning of a thriving open air market where local farmers would sell fresh produce they had grown, also pecans, honey, venison, wild turkeys, chickens, eggs all kinds of stuff out of the back of their trucks.
Across the street in Milam Park people traded news, spoke out about their favorite political issues and shared the gossip of the day. It was a famous place to hang out, mix and mingle.
Now this place is bordered by the elevated highway of I 10 and I 35 and the pillars holding it up are painted with scenes commemorating the history of this area.
There’s a playground and a place for people to hang out under the shade of the 8 lane highway roaring above like a mythic . . . meeting place of the gods or something.
The mural itself is 155 feet long and 18 feet high. It was painted by Hailey Marmolejo and Ashleigh Garza.
At the dedication ceremony on August 1, Marmolejo remarked “The mural is a representation of women and the work that they’ve done throughout the history of Market Square. Every element of the mural is female or symbolic of female, even down to the constellations they’re all different, women constellations.”
East of here about a half mile at the very center of downtown is another amazing mural. Eight stories high it towers over the parking lot at Houston and Jefferson.
I met the artist, Rudy Herrera, while he was painting it with the aid of a giant construction crane. It has quite a different theme. It’s called ‘The Last Parade’. I’ll leave it to you to figure out.
I could go on and on about San Antonio mural art and I have The tradition of Mexican mural art in San Antonio. It unites the city, gives us an identity and reminds of us of our roots, it amazes the tourists, it provides a palette for the artists and it makes bike riding around downtown a real adventure. I feel the spirit within.
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