Corrido de Boyle Heights, Boyle Heights, 1984

Corrido de Boyle Heights, Boyle Heights, 1984. Payless Shoes, exterior, 2336 Brooklyn Place at Soto (southwest corner), Boyle Heights. A Corrido is a traditional ballad-style Mexican song. In the current mural, local musician Margarito Gutierrez (descendant of mariachi Vargas de Teclitlan) is playing his virtuoso fiddle while El Piporro plays the accordion. Joe Alaniz (1933-1967) tears himself away from his shrimp and garlic to enjoy the music, and a newly-wed couple dances. This mural is at least the third to occupy this same wall. In about 1974, Frank Romero covered 200 square feet with a whimsical spray can heart. In 1978 the Citywide Mural Project brought together several artists to paint Our People (70' x 16'). Among those involved were John Valadez, Barbara Carrasco, Glenna Boltuch (Avila), Carlos Callejo, Leo Limon, George Yepes, and Rod Sakai. In the early 1980s that mural was destroyed when new earthquake codes required Payless Shoes to add steel H-beams and make other improvements to its unreinforced masonry building. Acrylic on stucco, 17' x 80' (1400 square feet), by East Los Streetscapers (David Botello, Wayne Healy, George Yepes), assisted by Paul Botello, David Morin, and Ismael Cazarez. Sponsored by Payless Shoe Source. -- Dunitz, Street gallery, p. 317, #68.