Major Latino Mural in San Antonio

San Antonio next month will unveil a monumental outdoor mural by Latino artist Jesse Trevin~o, a public emblem of the Texas city’s growing importance as a center of Latino arts and culture.

Next year, in the fall, the San Antonio Museum of Art expects to open an $11-million, 30,000-square-foot-wing to showcase what is one of the most comprehensive Latin American folk art collections in the U.S. Next month, Oct. 17 through Jan. 4, it also will open a 300-item exhibit, “El Alma del Pueblo,” on the folk art of Spain and its impact on the Americas. In 2000, the city plans to reopen a restored Alameda Theater to feature Latino performing arts. San Antonio is already home to the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center for promoting Chicano, Latino and Native American culture.

The new mural, which the artist says is the largest of its type in North America, measures 40 by 90 feet and uses about 150,000 tiles. Depicting a child holding a dove with a guardian angel in the background, it is mounted on an outer brick wall of the Santa Rosa Children’s Hospital in the Market Square area.

Artist Trevin~o, whose works hang at the Smithsonian Institution and other sites, was born in Monterrey, Mexico, and reared in San Antonio. While an art student in New York, he was drafted into the Army to serve in Vietnam, where he lost his right hand to sniper fire. He later retrained himself to work with his left hand. The public unveiling of the mural, called “Spirit of Healing,” is scheduled for 7:15 p.m. Oct. 7. Information: (800) 447-3372.