Ivan + Darkroom 1 / Sandra Painting - Day / 3/12 / Murals

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This is scene four, take one, roll two.

Okay, I believe the murals, well that's the way I see it.

I believe it's like ours, it's like the Latinos, it represents us.

Some other group may have those, but I've never seen those in some other community.

If you go to the Mexican, you see murals everywhere in the Puerto Rican community, even some other Cubans community that we have a small one here in Chicago.

You can start seeing those murals, they represent us.

And I don't know the reason, it could be that we are the one who has to struggle here.

I mean, we want to, I don't know, probably want a piece of the pie.

We're telling the people, we're here, we're fighting.

And everyone had to see those murals.

Even, they put, I don't know if they put those murals for us directly, some of them.

Or they'll do it for, well, a mural would be seen by so many people.

Even the people in power, people that have the power in the city to help us.

And every time they pass by, they had to see it.

And driving there every day, they're going to start asking questions, what do these people want? And I see it like it's ours, because when you go to Puerto Rico, when you go to Mexico, when you go to Latin America, you see murals.

But there it's different.

The murals there are against the government there.

They want to fight for independence, they want to fight to get control.

Probably the message is the same, but they present it in a different way.

That's how I see the murals.

I mean, it belongs to us, but I don't know, I respect that.

Also the murals represent not only is a message, but also is art.

We had to remember that it's not only the message.

We had to see the creative of the person, how he's being creative in doing it.

We had to give credit to those persons who are doing it.

For us, it's more than seeing a painting at the museum, because there, it doesn't represent us.

First, we don't see anything in those.

I don't understand the painting that I see at the museum.

You see a couple of brushes here and there, but I don't know what they mean.

Probably because some other people don't have problems, and those are their problems, that is being represented on those paintings.

But to us, the murals represent our problems.

We see it every day, and we don't see the painting at the museum interested to us.

To tell you the truth, I don't understand, probably because I'm not that much into art.

I respect their view, even though I don't understand what they want.

If they come to me and explain to me that the paint and the artist are trying to reflect their problems, then probably I would understand what Picasso means.

I would say, well, those are the problems from the rich people that he's painting.

But I don't understand their art.

But the murals is our museum.

You see, you look this way, you see one, you look the other way, you see another one.

You don't have to know anything about art to understand a mural.

You know that that's your life, that that's the way you live, that that's your future.

Someone is, the painters, they put it in a way, they're realistic.

I mean, when you see the bottle of drugs there, they're on painting the other way.

That's the way you see it.

That's the way you see it on the street.

And mural photos, it's our museum in a way, but they're realistic.

Scene four, take three.

Okay, I started photographing those murals because the community, I don't know what's going on, but we're losing a lot of property through fires.

The city wants the land and their building, and they tore down those buildings.

And I don't know if someone else is doing it, but I started doing it.

I started photographing those murals in order to preserve, I was doing it for myself.

I never done anything for any other people.

And I don't belong to any group.

I just go out, grab my camera, and I said, I know they're going to tore down that building.

And I want to maintain, and I want to keep that painting with us, that piece of art that reflects our life.

That's one of the reasons that I always go out and photograph the murals.

And I not only try to do it in an artistic way, just taking the picture.

And there are times that I present some of my friends, and I see, I would let them know where this mural was.

And they feel sad about it because we lost something.

But the city, the neighborhood that we live right now, that I belong to, they're going through a lot of rehab.

Different people are moving in.

We're moving out.

We don't see it.

We just keep moving.

And I would like to see my community stay and move forward where we are right now.

But we don't have no control over the property.

We have to move.

Identifier

F.2021-10-0002

Date Of Production

March 12 1989

Abstract

Photographer Iván Justiniano talks about the significance of murals in the Latino community, followed by silent footage of high school artist Sandra Antongiorgi painting on a canvas.

This footage was shot for an unfinished documentary about the visual language of murals in Chicago's Hispanic communities.

Format

16mm

Extent

398 feet

Color

Color

Sound

Silent

Reel/Tape Number

1/1

Notes

The digital representation attached to this record consists of a 16mm negative picture element (F.2021-10-0002) synced with a portion of a separate ¼" magnetic audio reel (Dobinsky 080).

Language Of Materials

English

Element

Negatives

Genre

Documentary

Form

Unedited
Interviews

Subject

Art
Street art
Hispanic Americans
Photography

Related Collections

Susan Dobinsky Collection

Main Credits

Dobinsky, Susan (is co-producer)

Dobinsky, Susan (is filmmaker)

Bayly, Ronn (is co-producer)

Regele, Susan (is co-producer)

Kurtz, Julia (is co-producer)

Participants And Performers

Antongiorgi, Sandra (is participant)

Justiniano, Iván (is participant)

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