Tag: public art

Hummingbird Jubilee painted at Escondido’s Maple Street Plaza!

Feast your eyes on this!

An absolutely amazing mural is being painted in Escondido. It’s on the side of a building at Maple Street Plaza, and appears to be almost completed. I spotted the new mural behind a fence today as I walked down Grand Avenue. Information posted on the fence tells the story of this colorful artwork, which is titled Hummingbird Jubilee!

The artist is teacher and small business owner Brenda Gunderson Townsend. She operates Brilliant Spectrum Art. Here’s her Instagram page.

According to the posted info, she’s an Art Educator at the Center for the Arts Escondido, as well as the center’s lead Scenic Artist. The mural is her special gift to the entire Escondido community!

Brenda started painting Hummingbird Jubilee in late September. It’s in a stained glass style, in a nod to the Arts & Crafts movement. It measures 100 feet long by 14 feet tall. According to what I read, the City of Escondido will host a big unveiling event for the finished mural.

Wow!

I took photographs through the surrounding chain link fence…

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Beautiful mural at Palomar College Escondido Education Center.

Renowned artist and illustrator Rafael Lopez painted this very colorful mural in Escondido during the summer. You might recognize his abstract style. The inspirational mural greets students arriving at the Palomar College Escondido Education Center.

(I took a long walk through Escondido early this morning . . . then Oceanside around noontime! I discovered all sorts of great street art and public art during my adventures. Stay tuned!)

The story behind this beautiful Rafael Lopez mural can be found in this article. I didn’t know the school has a comet as its mascot!

I like how images of life, growth and reaching skyward are important elements of the design.

If you love this artwork, you might want to check out other Rafael Lopez murals around San Diego. You can find many of them documented in past blog posts by clicking here.

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Thank you for sharing!

Cool mural in Hillcrest celebrates San Diego!

Have you seen this very cool mural in Hillcrest? It’s painted around a corner of the California Bank & Trust building at 3737 5th Avenue, a bit away from the street. I hadn’t noticed it until my most recent walk through the neighborhood, about a week ago.

The artwork celebrates San Diego!

Images in the mural include the downtown San Diego skyline (including the El Cortez and Coronado Bay Bridge), Balboa Park’s iconic California Tower and Cabrillo Bridge, the San Diego Zoo, Mission San Diego de Alcala, and the Hillcrest landmark sign!

The art was created by @AustinGosswiller and @JackStrickerArt. Looking at the latter’s Instagram page, it appears to have been painted in 2023.

Awesome!

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Thank you for sharing!

Modern Day Artist appears in San Diego!

A successful artist these days must wear many hats, and keep working at their art around the clock. That appears to be an important message in the recently painted Modern Day Artist mural in San Diego’s Hillcrest neighborhood.

It’s easy to miss this colorful public art. It’s on the east side of a building on the 800 block of Washington Street. Those driving east, right past the mural, will likely not see it unless they check their rearview mirror at the right moment.

The cool artwork was created a few months back by Kolten French (@koltenfrench), co-founder of Mindful Murals.

When I learned of the mural about a week ago, I walked from downtown up to Hillcrest to check it out!

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Thank you for sharing!

Tower of Ten Billion Stars stands in San Diego!

A very unique sculpture can now be approached by the public on San Diego’s waterfront. More construction fences have come down at the new Research and Development District (RaDD) complex!

The Tower of Ten Billion Stars is another work of monumental art on what is called the RaDD Artwalk. You can spy the narrow oblong sculpture standing strangely on one end, by looking south from Broadway, east of Harbor Drive.

The creator of this shimmering “tower” is Lindy Lee, a Chinese-Australian artist. As its official description states here, it stands as both a beacon and wayfinder.

Hundreds of small holes in the sculpture’s side allow the passage of bright daylight. The holes shine like visible stars in a silvery sky. They seem to form constellations. Stars–like the North Star–have been wayfinders since ancient times, right?

I’m not sure why it’s a Tower of Ten Billion Stars. There are 100 to 400 billion stars in our own Milky Way galaxy. And there are between 100 billion and 2 trillion galaxies in the Universe.

Perhaps this curving tower is like a tiny, tiny, infinitesimal sliver of the inconceivably vast and mysterious Cosmos.

I walked around the sculpture this evening and took some photographs. I love those reflections of palm trees and nearby tall buildings!

(I also love how “beyond boundaries” can be read nearby. Astronomers can only theorize. The words are actually in reference to a World Design Capital event being held at RaDD.)

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Thank you for sharing!

The Art of Immortalizing Heroes in San Diego!

An extraordinary War Memorial can now be experienced inside the old Command Center building at Point Loma’s Liberty Station, former home of the Naval Training Center San Diego. The artistic Memorial is titled The Art of Immortalizing Heroes by PISANO Artistry.

A long hallway is filled with amazing three dimensional murals made primarily of painted drywall screws! Over 100,000 of them! The Memorial is also composed of thousands of dog tags and wooden stars.

On the wall opposite the 3D murals is a long corrugated panel that replicates both the Vietnam Memorial Wall and the Freedom Wall.

About 2000 volunteers in the military and San Diego community helped to make this War Memorial. It also celebrates Liberty Station’s Centennial.

The artist is Joe Pisano. He envisioned a Memorial for Veterans who haven’t been able to visit the War Memorials in Washington, DC. It honors all those who’ve served in the United States Armed Forces.

I’m so glad I discovered this Memorial on Veterans Day weekend, so that you can experience it, too.

Does this unique artwork appear familiar? I covered Joe Pisano’s drywall screw art in 2023 at the USS Midway Museum. See that old blog post, complete with a photo of Joe smiling, here!

Vietnam Conflict panel. Three soldiers returning from patrol.

Global War on Terrorism panel shows the Battlefield Cross in tribute to those lost in Iraq and Afghanistan..

Unsung Heroes panel. A variety of heroes, past, present and future.

World War I panel, with soldiers and a field of poppies.

Korean War panel of soldiers on patrol.

Funeral Honors panel, depicting Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

World War II panel, with Marines and Navy Corpsmen raising the flag at Iwo Jima.

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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!

I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Statue of basketball legend Bill Walton at YMCA!

A bronze statue of basketball legend Bill Walton with his beloved bicycle stands just outside the entrance of the Mission Valley YMCA in San Diego!

I heard the San Diego Blood Bank was having a blood drive in honor of Bill Walton at this YMCA today, so I figured I’d come on down. Of course, I had to take photographs of Bill Walton’s joyful sculpture!

Here’s a 2016 article about the sculpture’s creation. It explains: Bill Walton led the UCLA Bruins to national championships in the early 1970s before playing for San Diego Clippers, the Portland Trail Blazers, and Boston Celtics and joining the NBA. Walton won two NBA championships and was named the NBA valuable player. He was also a very dedicated Grateful Dead Deadhead!

The artist who created the life-size, carefully detailed sculpture is Alison Brown. She really captured his energy and love of life. Bill frequently visited the Mission Valley YMCA, and he would greet everyone with his big smile.

Bill Walton grew up in La Mesa near Lake Murray and played high school basketball at Helix High School. He spent his later years living in San Diego, where he was an active public figure and loved by many. Check out his Wikipedia page to learn of his many accomplishments.

The statue’s plaque recalls how Bill Walton spent many hours at the Mission Valley YMCA. Because the indoor pool soothed his chronic pain, he said the Y saved his life.

Finally, here’s the web page concerning today’s inaugural Bill Walton Memorial Blood Drive. There’s a button you can click if you’d like to donate blood in the future. You can schedule a visit to the San Diego Blood Bank or learn of upcoming blood drives!

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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!

I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

The new City Heights mural in Swan Canyon!

In September, this amazing new mural was painted on a long wall in San Diego’s City Heights neighborhood, down in Swan Canyon.

Local muralist Shayne M. Oseguera (with the help of other artists and community volunteers, San Diego Parks and Recreation, and San Diego Canyonlands) created colorful scenes of nature in a place that is often beset by graffiti.

I hiked along trails through Swan Canyon to get close up photographs this afternoon. I’ll soon be posting a blog about my hike, with directions on how to get to the mural.

In the next two photographs, you can see the long mural from across the canyon. You can also see how concrete surfaces beneath and beside the mural have been tagged with graffiti.

Now, after my short hike, I’m standing right next to the artwork. The sun was very low, making photography a bit challenging, so most of my shots are at an angle.

Enjoy these beautifully painted images of native plants, birds and other life in Swan Canyon!

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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!

I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

More bubbles are flying in Hillcrest!

Today I finally got around to photographing this great public art in Hillcrest.

Back in January, I posted photos of a fun “champagne bubbles” mural on the east side of the Bubbles Market & Spirits building. It was painted in 2023. See those pics here.

In 2024, the same creator, San Diego artist Jeremy “Jermz” (@jm47art), painted a continuation of that mural, but on the north side of the building near the store’s front entrance. A beautiful woman appears to be blowing more bubbles! That’s what you’re looking at now!

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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!

I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

A bright, musical mural at Liberty Station!

Look what I spied the other day! A bright, super fun mural was painted a couple months ago at Liberty Station in Point Loma!

The mural can be found along the arched walkway between THE LOT movie theater and Building 176, where a number of music and arts studios are located.

The very colorful artwork was painted by Paola Villaseñor, who goes by the artist name PANCA. Here’s her Instagram page.

The title of the mural is Yo No Soy Marinero, Soy Capitan. That means, in English: I’m not a sailor, I’m the captain.

As a nearby sign explains, this mural showcases the beauty of life and culture in San Diego, with a particular emphasis on the ocean... The artist states: “…the mural…reflects the history of Liberty Station and my role as captain and artist. My hope is that visitors will find joy…”

How could anyone walk through all this found joy without smiling?

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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!

I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.