Which Way, L.A.?
Restoring a Whitewashed Political Mural on Olvera Street
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Restoring a Whitewashed Political Mural on Olvera Street

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An 80-foot-long mural by Mexican muralist David Alfaro Siqueiros, covered up since the 1930's, is already re-emerging on the side of a building on Olvera Street in downtown Los Angeles. Anglo promoters expected a work called "America Tropical" to show a romantic Mexican village. What they got was a crucified peasant in a protest against American imperialism. We hear about the work, the cover-up and the restoration. Also, compared to Beijing, London doesn’t mind a little chaos at the Olympic Games. We talk with a physical therapist working with athletes from Southern California. On our rebroadcast of today’s To the Point, personal rage, religious hostility and deadly gunfire.

Banner image: A restorer from the Getty Conservation Institute works on "America Tropical" on Olvera Street in downtown Los Angeles. Photo by Saul Gonzalez

Making News

County Supervisors Vote on Measure R Extension ()

Los Angeles County voters will have a chance in November to extend Measure R, the half-percent sales tax approved overwhelmingly in 2008. It's all about public transit and is designed to speed completion of several LA Metro rail projects, including the 405 transit corridor in the Sepulveda Pass and the Subway to the Sea as far as Westwood. Christina Villacorte covered today's approval by the LA County Supervisors for the Daily News.

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Art, Politics and the History of Downtown Los Angeles ()

America Tropical is emerging again on the second-floor wall of the Old Italian Hall on Olvera Street in downtown Los Angeles.  It was painted by the Mexican muralist David Alfaro Siqueiros in 1932, sponsored by an Olvera Street booster named Christine Sterling. But she and the rest of the city's elite were so shocked by the picture that they whitewashed it section by section until it disappeared. Now the Getty Conservation Institution has almost completed the restoration. KCRW's Saul Gonzalez has the story. (Voices of Leslie Rainer, Getty Conservation Institute; Carmen Muñoz, Olvera Street merchant; and Chris Espinosa, General Manager of El Pueblo.)

 

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Reporter's Notebook

Physical Therapy for Olympians ()

Bob Kersee is the husband and coach of multiple world-record holder Jackie Joyner-Kersee, who's now retired. But he's a big presence in the Olympic Games. Robert Forster of Santa Monica is a physical therapist on Kersee's team who's been to five Olympiads. One of his athletes, Dawn Harper, won a silver medal in the 100 meter hurdles today and Allyson Felix made the finals in the 200-meter sprint.

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Hate, Terrorism, and America's Religious Pluralism ()

Image-for-WWLA.jpgSince they first arrived in the US more than 100 years ago, Sikhs have experienced brutal discrimination. Since September 11, they've been subject to scorn and retaliation.  Now six have died along with a gunman, after a shooting spree in Oak Creek, Wisconsin. Others are on the critical list. Investigators are trying to determine why Wade Michael Page shot up the Sikh house of worship. We hear from a man who knew him as part of the hate music scene and raise some disturbing questions about American intolerance of a major world religion.

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Underwriters

Which Way L.A.? is made possible in part by the Ralph M. Parsons Foundation and the Rosalinde and Arthur Gilbert Foundation.

 

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