{"id":61076,"date":"2024-06-07T11:09:10","date_gmt":"2024-06-07T18:09:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/eltecolote.org\/content\/?p=61076"},"modified":"2024-06-24T10:43:25","modified_gmt":"2024-06-24T17:43:25","slug":"raymond-michael-patlan-muralist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eltecolote.org\/content\/en\/raymond-michael-patlan-muralist\/","title":{"rendered":"Remembering Raymond Michael Patl\u00e1n: Master muralist dedicated to the people"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
Raymond Michael Patl\u00e1n had a profound impact on the country\u2019s mural movement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With roots in Chicago\u2019s Pilsen neighborhood, the U.S. born muralist of Mexican descent got his introduction to the art world by watching his oldest sister and her classmates paint a mural on their public school wall. Later on, Patl\u00e1n assisted a Mexican woman produce ceramics. The artistry of the work he witnessed moved him to pick up a pen and paper to illustrate scenes that touched him: images of the Mexican culture that dominated Pilsen in the 1960s and \u201970s. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
In 1966, he studied the art form in Mexico for several months, where he met renowned Mexican muralist David Alfaro Siqueiros. In a 2016 interview with Jackie Serrato, a Chicago journalist for Gozamos.com, Patl\u00e1n said: \u201cWhat I learned from Siqueiros [was] that muralism isn\u2019t like easel painting. It\u2019s a whole environment. It\u2019s an experience, a whole ambiente<\/em>. It\u2019s not just a painting on a wall.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\nMuralist Raymond Michael Patl\u00e1n at work. Photo: Gato K. Rivera<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
Patl\u00e1n\u2019s work painting murals in his beloved Chicago was delayed when he was drafted and shipped for a 13-month stint in Vietnam, where he served as a military correspondent for the Ninth Infantry Division that was stationed 30 miles northeast of Saigon. While there, Patl\u00e1n convinced a chaplain to let him paint a mural in the back of a chapel at Camp Bearcat. Titled \u201cThe Wall of Brotherhood,\u201d the 12 by 25-foot mural depicted the Vietnamese peoples\u2019 daily struggles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Shortly after returning to Chicago from his tour of duty, Patl\u00e1n met fellow Chicagoan Mario Castillo, who is often credited as having created Pilsen\u2019s first mural in 1968. Castillo\u2019s influence moved Patl\u00e1n to paint a mural in 1969 in the main sala<\/em> of Casa Aztlan, a community service center in Pilsen. Patl\u00e1n titled the mural \u201cHay Cultura en Nuestra Communidad\u201d (\u201cThere is Culture in Our Community\u201d).<\/p>\n\n\n\nRaymond Michael Patl\u00e1n painted murals on the inside and outside walls of Casa Aztl\u00e1n, a community service center in Chicago’s Pilsen neighborhood. Courtesy Photo: Latinx Murals of Pilsen<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
The iconic mural featured Mexican symbols like skulls and flowers and paid tribute to historical social justice figures like Benito Juarez, Emiliano Zapata, Pancho Villa, Frida Kahlo, Father Miguel Hidalgo, Che Guevara and Cesar Chavez, serving as a reminder of the need for unity against oppression. Patl\u00e1n also painted murals on the outside front walls of Casa Aztlan that showcased Mexican culture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cMario [Castillo] and Ray were the painters who launched the visual presence of art in Chicago in the 1960s,\u201d said John Pitman Weber, a noted art historian and close friend of Patl\u00e1n. \u201cBut Ray is credited for the explosion of visual art in Pilsen, both large and small, that gave the community identity.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In 1971, Patl\u00e1n, with the help of other artists, tried to paint a controversial mural in the Blue Island community. The mural, titled \u201cThe History of the Mexican American Worker\u201d celebrated Mexican farmworkers, unionized labor and the growing latino community in Blue Island. It sparked threats against the artists, threats to bomb the building and it eventually led the city council to issue a ban on the mural, ordering for it to be painted white. <\/p>\n\n\n\nDaniel Patlan (left) and Raymond Patl\u00e1n (right) stand in front of a mural. Photo: Raymond Patl\u00e1n Facebook<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
The mural was the subject of a precedent-setting legal case. When the city denied the artists a permit to paint, it claimed that the work constituted advertising in violation of a local zoning ordinance. Patl\u00e1n and the artists sued the city. The American Civil Liberties Union took the case to the Illinois Supreme Court, arguing the First Amendment right of the artist\u2019s to freedom of speech had been violated. The judge ruled in the artists\u2019 favor. By 1974, the mural was completed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Pilsen was hit hard by gentrification in the early 2000\u2019s, after more white and middle-class people started to move in. Companies began to buy up property to build luxury high-rises, increasing rents in the historically working-class neighborhood. By 2010, the Latinx population in Pilsen declined by 26 percent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In 2013, financial hardship forced Casa Aztl\u00e1n to close its doors. When a developer took it over in 2015 to create an apartment building, Patl\u00e1n\u2019s outside mural was painted over in gray paint, igniting fierce community opposition. In response to the backlash, the developer asked Patl\u00e1n to have the mural repainted. Patl\u00e1n agreed, on the condition that he would repaint the mural based on what residents wanted to see. The project was completed in 2017.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Patl\u00e1n\u2019s formal training as an artist began at the Art Institute of Chicago and later at the Academy of San Carlos in Mexico. In 1975, Patl\u00e1n left Chicago to relocate to San Francisco for a possible teaching position in the Chicano Studies program at U.C. Berkeley. The course focused on mural art and photography. However, the job offer was contingent on first getting a Bachelor of Arts degree. Being only a few units shy of getting the B.A., Patl\u00e1n quickly enrolled at Chicago State University and got the degree. Later, he would earn a Master of Fine Arts at California College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In 1983, Patl\u00e1n became the founding director of Creativity Explored of San Francisco, a studio for \u200b\u200bartists with developmental disabilities, serving in that role for 15 years. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Patl\u00e1n\u2019s most significant imprint in San Francisco was as co-founder, along with Patricia Rodriguez, of the PLACA project in the Mission District from 1982 to 1984. The volunteer effort led to the creation of 26 murals in Balmy Alley. Patl\u00e1n painted two murals and guided some 40 artists in producing the others. The project grew out of support for the Central American resistance movement in the 80s and against U.S. intervention in Central America. The artists also wanted to show solidarity with the growing Central American population in the Mission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At least three to four murals from that period still exist. As murals gave way to weather and reconstruction by new owners, new artists contributed new murals, and themes expanded to include other freedom struggles, AIDS, and gentrification. The murals stretch the length of Balmy thanks to the willingness of the property owners to allow their garage wall space to be painted.<\/p>\n\n\n\nA close up of the mural “Nosotros con C\u00e9sar y Dolores” which was originally created by Ray Patl\u00e1n and later restored by Carlos “Cookie” Gonzalez. The laundromat where the mural was painted was demolished to construct apartments. Photo: Mabel Jim\u00e9nez<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
As a resident of Balmy Alley, Patl\u00e1n kept his eye on the murals, and protected them as best he could. As a result, he was christened the Mayor of Balmy Alley.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
During his lifetime, Patl\u00e1n was responsible for over 100 murals. There are 62 of them in the San Francisco Bay Area, and 12 in Chicago. Internationally, he also painted two murals in Mexico, one in Vietnam and one in England.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Patl\u00e1n was born on September 4, 1946, in Chicago to parents Candido and Remedios (Gonzales) Patl\u00e1n. He died at the age of 76 in Oakland on April 15, 2024. Ray Michael Patl\u00e1n is survived by sisters Cecelia Patl\u00e1n, and Sally Chico, as well as numerous nieces and nephews. Two other sisters, Anne Bernal and Gloria Cerda, are no longer living.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To celebrate the life of the legendary muralist Raymond Michael Patl\u00e1n, there will be a public gathering in the Mission District\u2019s Balmy Alley on Sunday, June 23 from 4-6pm. For more details, please email patlanmemorial@gmail.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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