Let’s give The City Beautiful a facelift in colorful mosaic murals

Not often am I caught speechless. Last week at the Witter Gallery I was, as they say, gobsmacked when Mary Carmen Olvera Trejo from Zacatlán of the Puebla state of Mexico unveiled a mosaic portrait of me made from clay tile.

Wowser. I had no clue.

Dolores told me that gallery board member Patricia Hampton wanted the Cullens to show up at 5 p.m. Wednesday for a ceremony celebrating Mary Carmen’s weeklong art residency here. She was finishing work on a mosaic depicting a view looking south from Lake Avenue at the cobblestone bench endowed by Jim and Judy Spooner, and built by Jennifer and Todd Felton, that has become a landmark. The mosaic is brilliant, with geese flying over a setting sun — allusions to Storm Lake’s migratory story.

We met with Dick Davis of Danville, Calif., who has sponsored a burgeoning colony of mosaic muralists in Zacatlán over the past eight years. The town of some 60,000 has  turned into a tourist magnet in Mexico as its edifices have been covered in murals.

What used to be dark, drab alleys or walls defaced with graffiti have been put awash in brilliant color with renderings of the local Apple Queens (apples are a big deal in Zacatlán, our version of the Pork Queen), the Creation story, couples from each of Mexico’s provinces, the story of maize … the entire story of a town’s culture told in shards of colored clay tile.

Mary Carmen shows pictures of the bleak before of empty streets, and the after of vibrant sidewalks full of people admiring art and sampling the local fare.

It’s transformative. It created 30 new businesses. A dozen artists worked on a 300-foot-long mural bounding a cemetery.

Dick heard me speak right before the pandemic at the University of California, Berkeley, as a guest of author Michael Pollan and the graduate school of journalism. The retired Bay Area stockbroker visited Storm Lake later on his way to Chicagoland, where he worked with the Wilmette Arts Guild promoting indigenous Latino art.

One of the mosaics the artists created was a portrait of Storm Lake Times Pilot editor Art Cullen.

When Dick stopped in The City Beautiful he visited the library to use the computers. (He is the last man in Silicon Valley without a smart phone.) There, he bumped into Patricia Hampton and started talking art. She became enamored with the mosaic murals of Zacatlán and arranged for Mary Carmen to visit. (Two other artists were supposed to accompany her but they could not board the airplane because they forgot their Covid vaccination cards.)

Between them, they conspired to create this gift of a mosaic of my mug. Witter Director Cindy Barahona created the gray frame.

After blowing my nose, I began to appreciate the possibilities they offer:

Storm Lake could be transformed by public art, too.

Dick Davis wants to help. So does Mary Carmen and her legion of artisans. Hampton is checking out sites — the ISG engineers say that our buildings can support mosaic murals through winter, and actually may serve to buttress structures. For one, I would love to see the Times Pilot building at 220 W. Railroad transformed from a gray machine shed to a colorful depiction of history (maybe the railroad).

Just walking out of the Witter Gallery, spaces presented themselves all around, starting in the courtyard, and the courthouse, and the BV County Historical Society across the street from us, and our drab city hall, and Buena Vista University’s grandstands, and you name it.

Storm Lake could become known as the Midwestern center of mosaic murals, much like Columbus, Ind., became known for world-class architecture in a small town.

I want to see a mermaid somewhere. And a walleye. And, no doubt, a hog with an ear of corn in its mouth. It would be really cool if indigenous people from Mexico could work with the Ioway Tribe to depict their time here.

Everywhere you go in Mexico you see brilliant color. The small towns celebrate public art. Our sister city, Ayotlan, with fewer community resources has a stunning public art gallery and thriving local folk artists. Iowa, not so much. Public art is almost nonexistent. It does make a difference on how a place is perceived.

Hampton is on to something big here. It surely affects my view that my ego was so stroked, after I had determined earlier in the week that I was a worthless load who comes by it honestly — it might be genetic. Mary Carmen turned me into a fan. Too bad I have no money. But somebody does, and they should spend it making Storm Lake burst with color. The artists insist that the whole town come out and get full of mud placing shards of tile themselves. It could be a great way to bring people together doing something that generates sunshine even on the dreariest of days. It would be unique in the Midwest. It embraces the Latino tradition of murals and color. It could be a complete makeover for a place looking for one with its downtown master plan. This is a master plan like no other — putting indigenous artists working side-by-side with Storm Lakers making the community brighter.

Thanks to Mary Carmen, Dick, Cindy and Patricia for a priceless gift.

Art Cullen is editor of the Storm Lake Times Pilot in Northwest Iowa, where this column appeared. For more columns and editorials, please consider a subscription to the Times Pilot. Or, if you wish, you can make a tax-deductible gift to the Western Iowa Journalism Foundation to support independent community journalism in rural Iowa. Thanks.

Check out the great stuff from the Iowa Writer’s Collaborative:

Laura Belin: Iowa Politics with Laura Belin

Doug Burns: The Iowa Mercury

Dave Busiek: Dave Busiek on Media

Art Cullen: Art Cullen’s Notebook

Julie Gammack: Julie Gammack’s Iowa Potluck

Beth Hoffman: In the Dirt

Dana James: New Black Iowa 

Robert Leonard: Deep Midwest: Politics and Culture

Chuck Offenburger: Iowa Boy Chuck Offenburger

Mary Swander: Mary Swander’s Buggy Land

Ed Tibbetts: Along the Mississippi

Iowa Writers Collaborative: Iowa Writers Collaborative