Our cityscape might look much different. Ads, though smaller, could proliferate along with graffiti, and Portland, like Prohibition, may have just ushered in a virulent renaissance of outlaw murals, the kind that blitzed inner cities in the 60's and 70's at the beginning of the mural movement in this country. As government observed how effective murals were in creating neighborhood pride and identity, it gradually supported and co-opted the movement. The urge to paint on walls is as old as time and will not be stopped by City Council. It could be directed and nurtured as it is in other cities.
Murals are autobiographies of communities.
They represent the collective unconscious of a neighborhood. Murals fill what we have discovered to be a primal need to leave a trace, to find meaning, to give voice to all our hopes, fears and concerns, to envision the kind of community we want to live in, and to put it on a wall. For all of you who weren't at November's hearing, your testimony was sorely missed, and still needed. Ordinance No. 172882. Michael Randles is a Systems Analyst for S.C.A.R.I., a cultural research think tank located in Eugene, Oregon.