Why I Think Public Art Is Important to San Antonio

While I want this post to be about why I think public art is vital to this city, it's not just public art that I think makes the city great. I think that what makes San Antonio great is that anyone who lives here or visits here can be happy if, for nothing else, perfect moments.

I'm not just talking about the type of perfect moment that can be experienced by stopping before the bridge along St. Mary's Street near the Southwest School of Art to view this mural:


What does this mural show? Like most art, the message is in the eye of the beholder, and the meaning is open to interpretation. We can appreciate this art without knowing about the artist's vision.

What matters is that it's here, that someone with a ton of artistic ability painted it and that we've paused to look at it.

It's a perfect moment.

And that, to me, is San Antonio.

Clearly there's a mix of cultures here, and with culture comes expectation. People say that San Antonio is a small town. Not really. The city is growing, so much so that a drive toward any part of town at rush hour has become a test of humanity. But it is a small town in another sense.

While I was born in San Antonio when Henry Cisneros was Mayor back in 1984, my family moved to the small town of Madison, Indiana, on the banks of the Ohio River in southern Indiana, population 13,000, when I was very young. Despite their difference in size, the two cities continue to grapple with the same dilemma of attracting fresh talent without sacrificing the identity and distinction of people who've lived there for generations.

While San Antonio is a big city, the parallels between here and small-town Indiana are sometimes uncanny. People notice when something new crops up here. Like many other towns, the struggles with racism, nepotism, stagnation, urbanization and decay.

There is decrepitude in San Antonio, sometimes right next door to fancy hotels and mansions.
Fountains and banana trees sit next to deteriorating buildings. The sidewalk grates emit strange smells. The City's homeless population struggles to survive along these streets, often unheard. Here is the back of one of two buildings on St. Mary's Street:

The back of a historic building located along St. Mary's Street.

I know nothing about this building, other than it's in obvious disuse. It hasn't been renovated in a while. There are probably rats and cockroaches inside.

So why does a not-so-amateur flaneur like me find it so appealing?

I read a little about these two buildings when I got home, learning that both buildings were under review by the Historic and Design Review Commission to receive a historic designation through the Office of Historic Preservation. Reading about the City of San Antonio's plans gave me a different perspective than I gained on foot.

I've lived here for four years, and I still get lost downtown. Sometimes, I'll park on one of these streets and take the River Walk southeast toward Houston Street for a cup of coffee, only to find that three hours have passed and I've walked all the way through downtown and back again.

This happened recently. I started at the San Antonio Public Library, where I noticed these interesting limestone walls with blocks of stone removed, giving pedestrians a view looking northwest toward Main Street:

Outside the San Antonio Public Library.

Several hours later, the sun had gone down, and I found myself looking at a statue of the Virgin Mary outside the Ursuline Academy:

A statue in the courtyard at the Southwest School of Art.

This statue was likely created by a San Antonio artist, and while it's located behind the convent walls out of public view, it's still public art for students, residents and tourists to admire.

It's another perfect moment, and the longer I live in San Antonio, the more I find these discrete but fulfilling sights and sounds.

I'll admit that I'll always be a tourist here. Shopkeepers along Alamo Street ask me where I'm from, not just because it's their job to do so, but because I really look lost. It's OK. I don't mind. I'll usually tell them I'm from here and that I'm just out getting some fresh air.

Still, many of them seem mystified that someone who lives in San Antonio would venture downtown to walk along Alamo Street.

The City has made an effort to turn downtown into a place for locals as well as tourists. It employs street guides along Alamo and Market streets to offer information about dining and attractions to tourists. In 2016, it began its official Downtown Street Performer Program, giving artists a public forum to express themselves without the expectation of payment. Life's hard for artists in San Antonio like anywhere else, but the street performer program is the right idea for a city that's looking to widen its interests beyond the River Walk.

I think San Antonio could also benefit from a public touring program in which it hires young people to guide visitors to places they might enjoy – something akin to the Hugman Tour, but for sites that aren't located along the River Walk. This would be a dream job for many Millennials, who are looking for a dynamic and exciting job where they don't have to sit at a desk all day, and there'd be more than enough tourists.

Sadly, many visitors to San Antonio are given the wrong impression of the city and told by residents that there's nothing to do here. That's a suicidal statement from a city whose major industry thrives on tourism, and a discouraging thing for guests to hear. We need to do more to make sure people have the resources to discover everything that makes San Antonio full of perfect moments.

Featured caption: Public street art painted on a historic building along St. Mary's Street. 

Walking Along Broadway, A Visual Journey: Part II: Miraflores

I walked to Brackenridge Park today, camera in hand, to take some photographs of a curious gathering of ruins spanning Hildebrand Avenue west of Broadway Street.

My visit was partly inspired by an eye-catching statue I'd seen out of my periphery when driving toward the US-281 exit ramp the night before, in addition to a conversation I'd heard in the outdoor dining area at Central Market recently.

Three men, who were clearly from out of town based on the part of their conversation I overheard about them returning to Philadelphia, were having dinner together, and as they sat down with their entrees and drinks, one of the men made a joke about existentialism that prompted the other two to laugh.

As I eavesdropped, I heard the older gentleman talking about art and how he thought culture was changing and art was once again going to be a province of rich patrons and families.

Which leads me to the subject of this article: Miraflores.

A small park located at the corner of East Hildebrand Avenue across from the University of the Incarnate Word, it was under the original ownership of one Dr. Aureliano Urrutia who, according to this delicious article by writer Walt Lockley of Texas Escapes, was a Mexican doctor who arrived in San Antonio as a political exile in his early forties in 1915.

Mexico was full of violent insurrections and political unrest at the time, and Urrutia ended up operating on Mexican military gangster Victoriano Huerta's eyes and becoming a close adviser and minister of his government after Presidents Porfirio Diaz and Francisco Madero had their run in office.

Interestingly, the writer points out that Urrutia was known for trying to pass reform legislation under Huerta including a streetcar law and ordering the closing of pulquerias before eventually being accused of a medical assassination without anesthetic.

It was after his arrest by General Frederick Funston (After which nearby Funston Avenue in San Antonio is named) that he was able to exile himself to the U.S. by ship from Veracruz to New Orleans and by train to San Antonio.

While the article ends inconclusively on whether he was a war criminal, an innocent exile or something else, it's clear that he owned the property in and near the park, including 15 acres, from roughly 1925 through 1950, according to the Brackenridge Park Conservancy.

The San Antonio Conservation Society has had its eye on restoring Miraflores for a long time. Work is currently underway to complete the renovation of the entry towers and gates to Miraflores as part of the Mitigation for the Broadway Drainage Project under the Broadway Corridor Phase IIIA – Miraflores Park Mitigation Enhancements. 

As I was walking along an uphill lane from the park onto a sidewalk along Hildebrand Avenue, I noticed a placard featuring photographs of Urrutia's original conception for Miraflores. He created the contemplative garden as a reminder of his native Xochimilcho, Mexico.

Eroded ceramic tiles on the north side of the entry gate towers are being documented and removed, and new ceramic tiles, made in Mexico from the same region as the original tiles, are being installed. The stone wall and metal fence along Hildebrand have also been restored. (Image and caption courtesy of Brackenridge Park Conservancy.)




The city is working with RVK Architects to develop Miraflores as a cultural landscape. It's currently housed in a fenced-in property behind the AT&T Center along Broadway Street and is inaccessible to the public, but I infer from this that because of the plan and the regulations of the Texas Historic Commission, the garden will eventually be open to the public for people to peruse, take photos and admire the curious collection of stone statues that Urrutia procured.

There's no doubt the infamous doctor was a bit eccentric. Landmarks spotted around many other parts of San Antonio – including mid-century artist Dionicio Rodriguez's "faux-bois" structures, made of concrete shaped to look like wood – dot the landscape, along with a headless angel.

I spotted the angel just after turning right onto Hildebrand and heading down the steep sidewalk, passing a sign advertising a "Larger than Life" insect exhibit at the San Antonio Zoo.

The headless angel statue is larger than life itself, and an irresistible subject for a photo. The afternoon shadows cast the angel's wings, shoulders and neck, as well as the ornamental lions abutting her sides, in a lemony light while the statue's bust remains shadowed in earthy gray. The angel's body is sculpted and elongated in the style characteristic of the Italian Renaissance – Sandro Botticelli's lithe-bodied nymphs from "Venus" and "Primavera" come to mind. I can't help but snap several pictures as I head down the sidewalk, stopping to capture some vertical shots before turning back again.

My first photo of the headless angel, taken from directly in front. 

The same subject, taken vertically and facing southwest

Photo taken to the southeast

Something strange happened as I took more pictures from different angles. The headless angel seemed to take on a different character from the composed figure I saw when facing her. Facing southeast, the body was totally cast in shadow, with only the wings touched with light. From this vantage point, the angel took on a tormented look, her body encumbered by twisted garments. It's almost like she's struggling to fly.

Once I'm able to take a surrounding picture of the entire garden and the nearby property, it gives a better idea of what Mr. Urrutia might have had in mind here: Much like a gazing pond, this private domain was clearly meant as a display of not only wealth and artistic appreciation, but something beyond the traditional artwork found around other parts of San Antonio. It could be public art, but it's on private property, giving it a kind of forbidden appeal.

Looking southeast again, the body in shadows

Studying the statue, I wonder what Urrutia's inspiration was for including it in his motley collection. What's more, the staircase leading up to the three statues is disconnected from any permanent structure and is instead floating in a sea of green grass. If the placement of these objects is intentional, it gives the odd feeling that a large building or structure that once existed in the center of them has gone missing, though there are no clues of such a building remaining.

It isn't difficult to see why the city wants to make this park accessible to the park, and with the next phase of restoration including a walkway leading from Brackenridge Park into Miraflores (there was a bridge and terrace in place, but the gate was locked, and water from the river streamed over the sidewalk), it will send the message that Miraflores is a place for everyone to see and enjoy.

View encompassing the faux bois structure, obelisks, vegetation and rear of AT&T building.

A Movie About San Antonio: What Would It Be Like?

What would it be like to make a movie in San Antonio?

I can see the plot unfolding now: Two unassuming tourists leave their hotel to go sightseeing one morning, expecting to come home with some colorful photographs and bellies full of delicious Tex-Mex food. They're in the middle of touring the Japanese Tea Garden one afternoon when there's an unexpected turn of events.

Here's another idea: A journalist who's covering the local arts scene discovers that he or she has inadvertently become part of the story.

It could happen here, right?

San Antonio is certainly not new to the movie scene. Most locals and TV fans remember Pee-Wee's Big Adventure, made in 1985, where Pee-Wee Herman treks to San Antonio to find his bicycle and ends up taking a tour of the Alamo.

Plenty of other movies have been made in San Antonio throughout the decades, and many celebrities make their home in San Antonio.

The city is also home to a variety of outlets for people to express their cinematic skills and creativity. Local non-profits such as Urban-15, which hosts the Josiah Media Festival (Open to anyone 21 years old or younger with a Call for Entries from now through June 1) and the San Antonio Film Festival give artists and filmmakers a solid platform to share and display their cinematic work with a variety of audiences from around the world. (The Call for Entries for the Film Festival's annual contest is currently open with a March 24 deadline.)

Some of San Antonio's filmmakers have been on the scene for quite some time. Erik Bosse, a writer and filmmaker who works with art and cultural centers throughout the city, is involved in a variety of collaborative works with the local theater and dance community. He creates films that explore urban environments and recently contributed video to Mujer Enterrada: Something Happened Here, a multi-media installation located at Centro Cultural Aztlan, San Antonio's 40-year-old Chicano/a arts and cultural center.

The project celebrates the organization's yearly exhibition exploring the cultural implications, both historical and contemporary, of the signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo on Feb. 2, 1848. This year, the staff and curator worked to highlight the treaty's impact on women, naming this year's show Mujeres de Aztlan y El Segundo de Febrero. The project will be on display through March 15.

Bosse worked with ritualist and theater artist Laurie Dietrich, movement artist Amber Ortega-Perez and structural weaver and fiber artist Doerte Weber to complete the installation, assisting with the short movie that played on a loop.

An image from Bosse's video installation. (Image courtesy of Erik Bosse.)

Bosse has worked on other short films, too, including Magical Creatures: The Butterflies, a scene from Urban-15's recent multi-media performance piece, Lucia in the Faerie Garden, featuring dancers from the group's performance ensemble, including me.

Working on the video for this piece was a lot of fun. It began with a trip to Mission Espada with the Urban-15 production team, including artistic director Catherine Cisneros, Sound Design and Music Composition director George Cisneros, Music and Media Assistant Jonathan Anderson and Event Coordinator Marisol Cortez, and continued with an experimental flight through the park in the red and blue butterfly costumes designed by Catherine.

Erik filming me dressed as a butterfly as part of the video segment of Lucia in the Faerie Garden. 

While I've envisioned making my own movies here and along the stretches of South Texas, this was my first time participating in the making of a video in San Antonio, and for that, I'm really proud. Seeing the butterflies in motion afterward was transcendent, and feeling like a life-sized insect gives a feeling that's comparable to nothing else.

Later in the park, stretching my wings. 

Dancing in the Dark, on Concrete

Me in costume after Carnaval de Muertos 2015.

Standing outside Centro de Artes with the Urban-15 Group's performance ensemble after the Dia de los Muertos opening on Oct. 27, I realized how far I was from the tiny studio in southern Indiana where I used to study dance.

The studio in Madison shared space in a strip mall with a flea market, a movie theater and an arcade. It had three dance rooms – a large one for big classes and two smaller spaces for individual study.
I began taking tap, jazz and ballet dance lessons at a young age at downtown locations before transitioning to the new studio on the hilltop in high school. That was when I also began teaching dance to three to 12-year-olds.

Since the director wasn't always in town, she gave me a key so I could open and close the studio after school and at closing time.

Having a key was one of the perks of the job, because I could practice there on weekends when no one else was around. Alone in the main room, I turned off all the lights and did my warm-up stretches, positions at the barre, floor work and routines. Unlike the hardwood surfaces at the former studios, the floor was concrete and hard on the feet, but I didn't care.

I remember practicing in the air-conditioned studio on hot summer nights and hearing people banging on the front door. Kids who'd just gotten out of the movies would cup their hands over the glass and peer inside, trying to see who was dancing in the dark.

In a small, quiet town, a dance studio stood out among the other shops and businesses. I always kept the door locked when I was there alone, though no one ever tried to come inside.

In the winter, the studio provided a respite from the snow and ice. I'll never forget the feeling of wearing wool leg warmers and tights over dry, itchy skin, or the sound of wind blowing sleet against the windows as I stretched my muscles to keep them limber despite the brittle cold.

I worked at the studio for two years before I discovered the secret door in the back room.

The door opened onto a dark hallway behind the theater, and the hall was filled with the smell of popcorn and the ambient sounds of the films playing on the other side of the wall. At the end of the hall, glass double-doors opened onto a huge, empty room that looked like it was once a department store.

Without shelves and clothes racks taking up the floor, the room was as big as a gym. It was the perfect place to spread my wings.

I drove there on the weekends, plugging my little boom box into an outlet on the far wall and warming up to songs by Technotronic. The music sounded metallic against the hard floor and walls, and the room was so big, there was a split-second delay before the beats bounced off the opposite wall.

There were no mirrors or barres, only my reflection staring back at be from the plate glass office windows like a ghost.

Sometimes I stayed until dark, and headlights from the occasional car in the alley behind the mall cast my twenty-foot-tall shadow against the walls.

The place wasn't clean or even safe. Dead bugs and cobwebs lined the corners, and I could tell by the musty smell that animals had been in there. Still, it was my space to practice, and it became a routine and even a ritual over the next several months.

Once I graduated from high school, I was accepted into the dance program at Butler University in Indianapolis, heading to the big city to study ballet. I pursued it during my first year of college before switching to other majors – first English, then psychology and finally journalism.

Being a journalist has been as challenging as being a dancer in a lot of ways, from finding opportunities to receiving funding and community support. It's also unpredictable, with a lot of highs and lows. The old saying used by performers, "Hurry up and wait," applies to journalism, whether it's in waiting an hour for a press conference and a two-minute photo opportunity to meeting strict deadlines.

Still, dancing has followed me everywhere, and I've always had friends who were dancers, from the passionate people at Urban-15 to the street performers who set up along the walls and terraces of downtown San Antonio.

Recently, I ran into a friend who is a dancer while walking downtown. She was waiting for the bus at St. Mary's Street and recognized me. We talked for a while.

"You seem so calm and relaxed," she said. "Tell me your secret."

I don't have one, but if I did, dance would be it. While there have been long periods of time when I've been neither calm nor relaxed, I can't help but wonder if dance hasn't helped me handle stress in other areas of my life. This is one of the main reasons I'm going to keep doing it for as long as I can.
The studio in Madison closed its doors about ten years ago, so all I have is memories of the place. Sometimes I wish I could go back in time and be a student there again.

When I think about where my journey has led, though, I realize I'm happy right where I am.

Walking Along Broadway: A Visual Journey, Part I

I went out walking today. It was a beautiful day, with flat, peaceful clouds floating across the sky. I wore my flip-flops down to Central Market and north on Broadway to the coffee shop. I saw some interesting things along the way.

First, there was a slab of sidewalk with impressions of leaves in the concrete. It was just before sunset, golden light was flooding beneath the leaves of the trees.

As I walked farther, I discovered another interesting landmark: a palm tree pushing itself tenaciously between the sidewalk and this telephone pole.

How do trees do this? I've actually see other palm trees growing like this here. It almost looks like the tree is invading a concrete planet. I really hope this tree survives. Its root structure is buried the under the rock, so maybe it's impervious to diseases that would attack it if it were more exposed. You know what they say: Life finds a way.

Closer to home, I found a message written in in an older section of sidewalk.

There are many stories and legends about the origin of the American expression, "Kilroy was Here." San Antonio is home to the largest military retiree population in the world, according to this entry written by Captain Stephen R. Ellison, a doctor specializing in emergency medicine, at www.kilroywashere.org.

One story that appears more than once on the website tells of a man named Kilroy who might have been either an admiral during World War II or an inspector on a ship. The second story relates how Kilroy would sign this message in lieu of a formal written inspection or if the necessary people weren't around.

There's also apparently a story in Earth is Room Enough by Isaac Asimov that tells his science fiction version of the legend.

As with other sightings of the intriguing message, the drawing of the famous Kilroy character is here, too, although it's very faint. You can see it if you relax your eyes over the first two letters.

Conversations, Part II: Vans

Vans. They're everywhere.

We all have our own stories about vans, whether we rode in one as a kid, camped in one as a teenager, own one as a parent, or live in one that's stocked with a fridge, furniture, a TV, and other amenities.

Chances are we've all ridden in a van at least once. Earlier tonight, two generous men drove a separate van of Urban-15 dancers to our performance gig at San Antonio College. I sat in the middle of three rows with five other ladies, and we had a great time laughing and listening to oldies on the KONO 101.1 radio station.

While my family never owned a van, I have plenty of memories of riding in vans with childhood playmates. I remember peering out the back window of my parents' car as we drove past vans on the highway. As a kid, I was fascinated by the fact that some of the vans had decorative curtains in the rear and side windows. I know now that the curtains were there mainly for privacy, though they still have that same homey appeal.

Jeff Spicoli not only rode in a Volkswagen Van with his high school buddies in the 1982 movie, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, he wore black-and-white checkered Vans while doing so.

Then there are vans that are useful for carrying heavy items. Japanese mini trucks, or Kei trucks, are a popular import in the U.S. Back in 2008, I interviewed a man while I worked as a field editor for Indiana AgriNews who built a family business out of buying and selling them to farmers. The vehicles are built in Japan and meet U.S. requirements for low and medium-speed vehicles.

I've also ridden in cargo vans that had too light a load in the back, resulting in a deafening clatter of metal to the floor of the van every time the driver turned a corner.

Good times.

While they'll never be as flashy or individualistic as the motorcycles Dennis Hopper, Peter Fonda, and Jack Nicholson rode in Easy Rider, vans are a great way to carpool, a terrific conversation piece, and a kitschy icon of American roadie culture, serving as a sort of ombudsman and reminder to share the road as well as the back seat.

But vans can carry social stigmas, too, depending on the context in which they're driven or ridden. Take, for instance, the resurfacing of the infamous video of Donald Trump riding in a van with Access Hollywood reporter Billy Bush in 2005 and making lewd comments about an attractive young reporter waiting outside the van.

Then we've all heard the horror stories about kidnappers driving around in unmarked vans, or the mysterious white vans rumored to be conducting surveillance.

There's a social dynamic to riding in a van, or any vehicle: The people inside are so insulated from their surroundings, they're liable to say anything. While there are public and private places, the inside of an automobile is both. It's built for comfort and for speed. The space inside may be small compared to the rest of the world, but it's sealed off, like the protective shell we wish we had.

It's a sad fact, though a testament to the strength and durability of cars, that buildings have been torn down, cities have blazed, and earthquakes have rattled the Earth, but that sun-bleached Millennium Hip-Hop party CD cover is still sitting on the backseat of my car, undisturbed since 2006, and that empty granola bar wrapper will remain lodged between the driver's seat and the console until I decide to throw it away.

That got me thinking about how we think of driving in terms of comfort. People choose a certain car or truck over another as much for interior comfort as for price and fuel economy. We want our rides to be as fun as they are functional.

So can cars be fun and functional, or are the two mutually exclusive?

Autos seem to go beyond statement-making design and mobility. In a way, they define who we are. Our roles in life may mature and change, but aside from technological additions, our modes of transportation stay basically the same.

George Carlin wrote about how vans and minivans were an insult to manhood because married men had to trade in their flashy cars once they got married and had children. It's that age-old conflict between individuality and community, which leads me to another philosophical question: Should riding in a car be a solitary activity, or is it better with buddies? What can vans tell us about how we've dealt with this dilemma?

It feels different when it's just me driving with no passengers. There's something about sitting by myself in a car in traffic that embodies that age-old feeling of being "alone together" with other people.

It's hard not to see how we've modeled the faces and physiques of our cars and trucks after the bodies of insects – highly mobile creatures with strong social hierarchies. Volkswagen even named one if its cars "the Volkswagen Beetle." While we as humans value our privacy and individuality, we are social animals with a need to make personal connections with other people. We want things to be personal, until we don't, whereas insects seem to fulfill both needs at once without sacrificing one or the other.

Maybe that explains the van's exotic curb appeal among the other road warriors. When you're riding in a van, it's not just you behind the wheel – you're sharing the space with other people.

Conversations, Part I: The Highway Stranger

The man is brilliant, an expert in almost everything an aspiring writer could ever hope for in a mentor.

He's good-looking, sharply dressed, quick on his feet and honest – sometimes brutally so.

We're standing by a bank of palm trees beneath the U.S. 281 underpass near Broadway Street when he delivers me his news.

"I'm glad we talked, because last week, I wanted to kill myself."

I give him a hard look, not wanting to answer in the wrong way. I want to offer him comfort, solace, counsel. I want to tell him we've all been there before, we've all doubted ourselves and each other and feared that we live in a world without meaning or purpose. I don't ask why, or how he would do it, or how serious he's considered it. Instead, I speak a few words in a strong voice:

"I don't think you should do that."

Hearing the man's despair is confusing given all his success, and I'm faced with the perverse hope that my knowledge of existential dread and how destructive it can be will come off as authentic.

One of my favorite writers is French philosopher Jean Baudrillard. In one of his books, Seduction, he wrote about a need to be loved, but an ability to be seduced. He put this phenomenon into terms as the play of the butterfly collector, the gamer, and the hysteric. In Baudrillard's mind, the seducer is suspicious of seduction and tries to codify it:

"By making the rule into something sacred and obscene, by designating it as an end, that is to say, as a law, he traces an uncompromising defense: for it is the theater of the rule that gains ascendancy, as in hysteria the theater of the body." (pg. 127)

While I tend to be an independent spirit, I do think that life provides us with certain rules. While I believe existence precedes essence, I also think we have a choice in how to abide by these rules. We're given great gifts and the power of choice to stand by them or abandon them.

Baudrillard's theory that certain people turn seduction on its head by turning these rules into laws is intriguing. At what point, I wonder, do people become afraid or suspicious of the terms of their existence that they think about putting an end to it? And why does our confidence and despair seem to ebb and flow with all the frustrations of modern daily life?

Anyway, something about the man made me think of the philosopher's writing, and about how whenever I'm sad about things like this, I think of my mom, buying me new clothes to wear to school, taking me shopping, walking with me along the nature trails near the house where we grew up. So often, I don't want to do anything but hold her close.

I don't say anything else about the man's story – I just take it and hold it to my ear like a seashell, listening to his whole precious existence roaring within, and then it sounds as soft as the sea.

I guess I just want to be his friend.