Lincoln Park Murals :: Comandanta Ramona

Lincoln Park Murals :: Comandanta Ramona
Originally uploaded by chacal la chaise.

Sometimes you just have to get away, steal a moment of solitude with just your thoughts and your camera. I put off photography using excuses like I must 1) read, 2) summarize, 3) work, 4) read more, 5) summarize more, and finally 6) sleep. But today, I said enough was enough. Perhaps it was a post-election ebbing elation; maybe it was the idea that I could get rid of whatever this flu/allergy is that I had by getting outside for a few minutes. Whatever the reason to leave the confines of campus, I knew I must go to Lincoln Park. The park lies beneath I-10 east, and is quite close to Thomason Hospital (and future new children’s hospital), Evergreen, Concordia and B’nai Zion cemeteries, and Jefferson-Silva High Schools. )

Lincoln Park contains a beautiful collection of small murals, painted on the freeway concrete supporting uprights. Originally an art project for students from Bowie High School, they have stood for many years. While some murals have small tags identifying a gang’s territory, the murals generally stand unmarked, in their colourful glory. When I arrived around 4:00 pm, it was quiet and cool with a slight breeze, with a brilliant Morenci turquoise blue sky over my head.

Fortunately, as I left the park, I drove to the area where the last (and most political and social activist) murals were. There I saw this beautiful and bright mural of the late Comandanta Ramona of the Clandestine Indigenous Revolutionary Committee (CGRI) and the leadership body of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN). Beautiful and petite, she sadly died of cancer after battling it for many years.

Unfortunately, I do not know who painted her image, but it is an inspiring and uplifting addition to the murals at this central El Paso Park that lies beneath the spaghetti bowl and I-10.