A Great Treasure

The “Great Wall of Los Angeles” is not in danger of being damaged by taggers, as are some of the city’s treasured murals, or painted over by contractors hired to cover up the tags.

But after 20 years of sunshine, rain, pollution and an earthquake or two, the half-mile-long artwork in the Tujunga Wash flood control channel could well succumb to benign neglect. Its paint is peeling, its colors fading, its panels threatened by beneath-the-surface fissures.

A campaign to match public funds with private donations could help save this important piece of public art in the heart of the San Fernando Valley.

The mural is painted along a stretch of flood control channel between Burbank Boulevard and Oxnard Street, parallel to Coldwater Canyon Avenue. Anyone who regularly travels that stretch of road has no doubt seen the wall; deemed the longest artwork in the world by the Guinness Book of World Records, it’s hard to miss.

But its significance is easily missed in a world where “art” is confined to something framed and hanging inside a museum. The world capital of murals--Los Angeles County has some 2,500--too often takes its premier art form for granted. How many Valley residents who speed by the concrete canvas each day know its origins?

The mural was designed in 1976 by artist Judith Baca, who founded the Venice-based Social and Public Art Resource Center, a nonprofit agency devoted to community-based artwork. Along with two dozen other artists, Baca spent seven summers supervising the work of more than 250 inner-city teenagers to create an ethnic history of California.

In sweeping lines and once-bold colors, the “Great Wall” depicts immigrants and Native Americans, the zoot-suit riots and the Hollywood blacklist.

Like most murals, its message is political--which is another reason not everyone wants to call it art. But art it is, and a vibrant, particularly Southern California form.

As important as what the mural portrays is who painted it--in this case, juvenile offenders whose involvement in the project transformed many of their lives. Baca wants to tap the same resource--her center runs a Neighborhood Pride program--to restore and protect the mural and, if enough funding can be found, update its timeline to the 21st century.

The Los Angeles City Council appropriately recognized the “Great Wall” as a city monument and earlier this month directed several public agencies to work with the city Cultural Affairs Department to secure funds for its restoration.

The $500,000 estimate includes adding viewing stations along an adjacent walkway. The funding is well deserved--but given the number of murals in need of restoration, and given the city’s too paltry budget devoted to this unique art form, it’s unlikely the department will come up with the entire amount needed to do a professional job.

Here is where Valley businesses and community groups come in. Restoring and even expanding this cultural treasure should be a community priority.

If the Valley Conference & Visitors Bureau is looking for ways to draw tourists, consider the visitors who appreciate this distinctive Southern California art sometimes more than Southern Californians do. And if Valley leaders are looking for a way to promote community pride, here is a project that not only links us with our past but with each other.

To Take Action: Community groups, corporations or individuals wanting to help with the restoration of the “Great Wall of Los Angeles” can contact the Social and Public Art Resource Center, 685 Venice Blvd. Venice, 90291, (310) 822-9560 or sparc@sparcmurals.