Great Wall of LA to Undergo Expansion in Time for 2028 Summer Olympics
Slated to finish in time for the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, artist Judy Baca's mural Great Wall of Los Angeles is undergoing major expansions. Artists hope that tne new section of the mural will inspire a new generation of young people and activists.
"The Great Wall in North Hollywood is one of the longest murals in the world, a National Historic Site, and it reflects the rich history of diversity in Los Angeles.
"This is what it was like to paint inside the channel, for the young people to be working with Judy [Baca]," said Carlos Rogel, Executive Director of the Social and Public Art Resource Center (SPARC) while pointing to an old photograph.
More than 400 young people worked on the mural alongside Chicana muralist Judy Baca, who co-founded SPARC in the 1970s. The Great Wall of Los Angeles was its first mural.
The colorful creation stretches along Coldwater Canyon Boulevard between Oxnard Street and Burbank Boulevard, near Los Angeles Valley College.
"They were able to over many years from '76-'83 produce these incredible paintings that capture these histories that are often invisible or untold or left out of history books," Rogel said.
The mural features six sections with 86 titled segments organized by decade, telling the stories of immigrant and minority communities. It captures parts of California’s history from pre-historic times through the 1960s with a small nod to the 1984 Olympics.
Now, thanks to a $5 million grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Great Wall of Los Angeles is about to undergo a major expansion.
"Judy will be coming back with a team of artists to design another half-mile of mural that will take us from the 1960s all the way to 2020," Rogel said.
The next section of mural will wrap around on the opposite wall with the hopes of sharing immigrant and minority history with a new generation of young people."— Ariel Wesler, Mar. 17 2021
This post is an excerpt. Read the full article on the Spectrum News 1 website.
Read more about Judy Baca.
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