- repr.enting his search for an express. style attunes to revolutionary ideals and illuminating his .

periments with airbrush paintmg=emetr Rainer, a veteran of the 01vera reet mural project ' who heads the team studying the Chouinard paintMg, called it "a great find" for the city and the . community. "If we are able to recover it," she .d, "it will give scholars and conVIEW FROM THE TOP: Dave Tourje of Chouinard School of Art stands above a wall where the mural is located. Partly visible at the bot- learn uc more about tom is a roof added in the 1940s that now bisects the muraL Siqueiros and his mural ACTIVIST ARTSISE Siqueiros painted three mu.s during a six-month stay in LA. painting technique in Los Angel.. It will also give the city one more potentially great example of his mu. work." Siqueiros, who died in 1975, was an influential figure whose .s in Los Angeles during a six-month sojoum. H. only outdoor paintMgs M the Unitcd States, they mark a tuming point M his development, said Los Angeles-based art historian Shifra M. Goldman, a Latin Amer. specialist who has vainen extensively about his o New Tim. Presbytei ri:17hu rch, which has owned

ctmti7

i " a nt "

lhe turtling point for the artist work throbs with revolution-

Siqueiros paint. three muAllied with Diego Rivera a. lose Clemente Orozco and

ary f aft.
t u r

hc

worlc Dave Tourje, an artist, contrac t g o t r ed x lit t r f e c , : recreation of the original institution. He discovered the location of the mural I. summer but didrit go public with the news until he had discussed the situation with current owners of the building and engaged conservators who could verify the .istence of the painting and assess its condition. The conservators completed their first round of tests Wednesday. The project fac. enormous challenges. But if "Street Meeting" can be saved and put back on public vieu, Tourje said, it will restore "something very "This is mind-blowing," said across the second floor of a historic building on Olvera Street. South Pasadena, a 2-year-old political content - though not before it had faded badly - the 18-by-80-foot mural is the subject rof i aimiv:r zervation tt on for nearly two decades. Another Siqueiros mural, "Port.t of Mcdco Today, an 8-by-32-bot painting commissioned for the patio of a home in Pacific Palisades, was restored to nearly pristine condition and moved to the Santa Barbara Museum of Art in 2002. The Chouinard mural, the of the LA. works, is a seminal piece, Goldman said, .2.

best known for fiery murals in Mexico City, he promoted large-scale wall paintMg . a public forum for social justiu. He found his political voice as an . student, helped union. fellow artists and concentrated on Communist Party affairs The masterpiece of the trio, from 1925 to 1930, when he "America Tropical, stretch. was imprisoned for his political activities and confined to Tax- sue again, with new urgency, co, M southern Mexico. and the climate seems to have Painted over within a few years Siqueiros traveled to Los of i. unve.g because of its Angeles in 1932 - perhaps at the imitation of Nelbert Mu, church and hope to devise a ply Chouinard, founder of mutually agreeable plan that the art school - and report- would let the Chouinard group edly got help across the border take back the school's former from film dir.tor Josef von home and restore the mural. Sternberg. While in Southern "Art belongs to the commuCalifornia, he painted port.ts nity, said Cho, who was born and murals, gave lectures a. M Korea, educated in Philadelspent a few weeksP Choui- phia and moved to Los Angeles nard, teaching a class in mural 16 years ago. "I love this city. painting and producing "Street but th. area do. not have speMeeting,' It was unveiled July 7, cial art and we want to help. I 1932, to a crowd of 800. hope the mural will be restored. Uncovering and preserving It would be good for the comthmuth is a long shot. The munity, conservators must do addition- The revelation that the mual tests to determine how much ral lives - in some form - was

appr buyi the c the m the find were Cho build The

cha talk