If Cortez could have a cultural motto, town leaders may want to consider City of Murals. Find out how artists transformed walls, even houses, into works of art.
Transcript
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If you’re looking for
public art in Cortez,
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look no farther than the
city’s streets and alleys,
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where more than 40 murals are on display
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throughout the Business District.
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You’re watching the Local News Network,
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brought to you by Keesee Motors
and Big O Tires in Cortez.
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I’m Wendy Graham Settle.
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Whether you’re driving up Main Street
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or walking down a side street,
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you can’t help but notice the many murals
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that decorate commercial and
public buildings around town.
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A local arts advisory committee estimates
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that more than 40 murals are on display,
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some hidden in alleys or
tucked away in parking lots.
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And when you find one
of the hidden murals,
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it’s like discovering an unseen treasure.
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Sonja Horoshko, a local artist and member
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of the city’s Arts Advisory Committee,
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said that the city’s collection
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of wall murals started as a random effort
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by unknown artists in the
1970s, that eventually morphed
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into an organized project
from town businesses.
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Well, it is an interesting story.
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It wasn’t begun by artists.
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It was begun by the landowners,
mostly on Main Street.
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Well, the large ones
you see on Main Street.
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They got together and made the effort
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because they saw the value of
the art murals on Main Street,
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hopefully to slow traffic
down a little bit,
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which it does do.
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I mean, they are interesting.
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The murals that came before that, though,
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were all sort of like the
canvas that people had at hand,
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and they’re on South Broadway,
they’re on motel walls.
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And artists around here,
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because we have no dedicated
exhibition space at all,
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we have no galleries, no
dedicated exhibition space.
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So, that’s always been the way it is.
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So, a lot of the murals are
kind of hand spun out of,
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you know, like, “Oh, I think
I’ll paint something here.”
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And possibly some of them
were in trade for things,
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like I remember one on
a coffee shop was traded
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for food and coffee and stuff.
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As the commercial mural project developed,
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Cortez businesses hired
out-of-town artists,
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and that didn’t sit
well with local artists,
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who then lobbied the city to
form an arts advisory committee
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to ensure that public
tax revenues were used
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to support local artists.
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As a result of the committee’s advocacy,
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the city of Cortez commissioned
a series of downtown murals
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between 2009 and 2018, resulting
in eight large-scale works
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that depict Cortez history and cultures,
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and are visible to motorists
driving on Main Street.
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The Advisory Committee
also published a guide
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that identifies all the
city’s known mural locations
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for visitors to use like a treasure map.
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Horoshko says the murals not
only have slowed traffic,
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but they’ve encouraged visitors
to hunt for the artwork.
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Over on the Sharehouse mural
that wraps around the corner,
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the newest one,
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I have so many people put
on Facebook their photo ops,
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their tours, and they
stand there like this
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in front of Ed’s
particularly, ’cause he did.
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He’s a very, very, very well-known,
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accomplished Native American artist,
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and he did autumn in
this particular mural,
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and it’s of Hovenweep,
so people recognize that
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and they go stand there and do a photo op,
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which was really nice.
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Additional value added to why
you would have these murals
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and how successful they are.
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How do you measure that?
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You can find copies of the mural guide
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at the Colorado Visitors’ Center.
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Thanks for watching this edition
of the Local News Network.
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I’m Wendy Graham Settle.
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