Fresno’s noisiest park transformed into city’s largest outdoor art gallery | Opinion
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Fresno artists transformed 20 freeway pillars at San Pablo Park into murals.
- Caltrans grants funded the art and park upgrades, totaling over $5 million.
- New murals and green spaces aim to uplift South Tower and attract community pride.
Fresno’s noisiest and most dubiously located park, set beneath a freeway, is now home to the city’s largest public art gallery.
The unlikely canvasses are 20 towering oval-shaped pillars built to support Highway 180 as it crosses above San Pablo Park through the South Tower neighborhood.
No longer nondescript cement hulks, the pillars have been transformed into vibrant murals by a collection of artists from Fresno and elsewhere who spent the last several weeks bringing their concepts to life.
Among the faces depicted are not only the usual luminaries (i.e. writer William Saroyan and poet Juan Felipe Herrera) but also writer Brynn Saito, activist Gloria Hernandez, nonprofit leader Naindeep Singh and a pair of retired Fresno City College instructors, Vincent Mendez and Kehinde Solwazi.
“That’s my Fresno City professor from 30 years ago!” exclaimed Angelique Hannah, pointing to the portrait of a smiling African-American man (Solwazi) in a white kufi cap.
I met Hannah on a recent morning while the South Tower resident danced her way around the park to the beat of a portable speaker that drowned out the constant freeway hum.
“It’s uplifting,” she replied when asked for her impression of the murals. “It changes things a lot. It attracts positivity and possibly a little more unity.”
Other pillars are adorned with images of familiar Fresno scenes. One has a giant-sized elote (Mexican street corn) on either side surrounded by massive chicharrones (fried pork rinds). The one next to it depicts a paletero, except this Mexican ice cream man stands 20-feet tall.
The pillars at San Pablo Park are purposefully rich in color, providing needed contrast to the drab concrete surroundings. Two by Fresno artist Caleb Duarte feature a giant sequoia tree on one side and children relaxing in nature on the other. Painted above the children’s heads – and almost up to the freeway span itself – are blue semicircles designed to represent “portals” to the skies above.
Art uplifts, makes us think
It isn’t lost on me there are actual giant sequoias, even taller than the ones depicted on the pillars, less than 60 miles east on 180. But how many kids grow up on these streets without actually seeing them?
That’s what art is supposed to do. Uplift the senses and also make us think.
“I think it’s more than paint on a pillar,” said longtime resident Kiel Lopez-Schmidt. “It’s taking the dominant eyesore of the neighborhood and making it beautiful. That’s a lot.”
The improvements at San Pablo Park were paid for by Caltrans’ Clean California Beautification grants. The same program also funded three murals on even taller freeway pillars that support a 180 connector behind Romain Park and a mural on the back of Romain gym by Fresno artist Mauro Carrera that was unveiled in December.
Two of the most striking, the creation of Fresno artist Daniel DeMeza and a five-person crew working in pairs, depict massive arms and hands that look like they’re holding up the overpass when viewed from First Street.
“It gives people a reason to smile every day, and that’s a really good thing,” said Ariel Howe, who along with Racquelle Justo Mendiola spent the last four weeks painting white puffy clouds on both pillars.
The murals are so tall the artists worked from an 80-foot boom lift that had to be constantly repositioned due to the pillar’s oval shape. They endured triple-digit heat (which caused the paint to dry too quickly), the constant freeway hum (a portable speaker helped) and the frequent honking of passing motorists.
Despite those challenges, Howe was psyched to be involved.
“There are a lot of things, to be honest, that I’d rather be doing right now,” she said. “But I said yes because this is an opportunity not a lot people are doing to get in this life.”
Artists ‘step out of poverty’
Getting paid well for your work also helps. According to Fresno Arts Council executive director Lilia Gonzáles Chávez, each pillar was commissioned at $30,000.
“So often artists are asked to work for very little money,” said Lopez-Schmidt, executive director of the South Tower Community Land Trust that coordinated three of the San Pablo Park murals. “It was nice that the state put some real resources into this and helped some artists step out of poverty.”
The official unveiling of the San Pablo Park murals is Saturday at 11 a.m. and will feature the artists, live music and food.
Combined with Tuesday’s ribbon-cutting of Broadway Parque, a new pocket park less than a mile away, the two projects add needed beautification and green space to one of Fresno’s most-neglected neighborhoods.
But perhaps things are slowly changing. Caltrans’ $5 million beautification grant also paid for new median islands, landscaping, cross walks and pedestrian lighting on Belmont Avenue between Cedar Avenue and Fulton Street as well as new bus stops and pedestrian lighting on Blackstone as it passes under 180.
San Pablo Park is also on tap for additional improvements. The park’s small, tanbark-surfaced playground will be removed and replaced by features designed for more active uses including multi-use sports courts, a fitness equipment area, a skateboard plaza and a stage, according to Fresno City Councilmember Miguel Arias.
That project is “shovel ready,” Arias said, and awaits the next round of Measure P funding. Even closer to completion are renovations to the nearby Ted C. Wills Community Center that includes a new kids’ playground.
“Overall we’re finally starting to see the fruits of Measure P investments with the addition of state investments in the district,” he added.
One park and freeway pillar at a time.
