Erasing our cultural history?

In all of the discussion concerning the fate of the Bernal Heights Library Mural, very little time has been spent discussing the actual visual content of the original artwork.  El Tecolote has tried to provide as much information as possible about the original mural, painted by Arch William, but some of it has been hard to come by.

The Cortland façade features an image of Victor Jara, a Chilean political activist and folk singer who was murdered in the military coup d’état that ended the administration of democratically elected Marxist president Salvador Allende. Jara is a musical legend and a symbol of political resistance through song, but his image appears nowhere in any of the new designs for the mural.

Also on the Cortland side of the mural, is an image of singer Roberta Flack and lyrics to a song by folk singer Holly Near, who is best known for her song “It could have been me,” commemorating the Kent State Massacre.

Three pyramids—Egyptian, Mexican and San Franciscan (the TransAmerica Pyramid) representing the passage of time and the continuity of culture—are gone because of a renovation that added a wheelchair ramp and ADA access door.

The Moultree side of the mural shows images of working women engaged in cultural, educational and political work. When the mural was painted, women were still gaining acceptance in the workplace and the now common images of career women held revolutionary significance.  None of these women appear in the proposed art for the replacement mural.

Also on the Moultree side is a portrait of Arturo Duran, a neighborhood youth whose tragic death was rooted in and symbolic of the tensions between Latino and Filipino youth.  Memorializing his death was a particularly important part of the project to the young people who helped paint the mural.

The south side of the building shows the progression of Bernal Heights, from its original Ohlone inhabitants up to the time the piece was painted.

The mural, despite rumors to the contrary, was approved by the SF Arts Commission and the Library Commission when it was painted in 1982.