TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) — Tucson public artist Ignacio Garcia is transforming a blank downtown wall on a parking garage into what he hopes will become a new city landmark.
VIDEO: See my visit to the mural in progress in the vid below - and watch as Garcia and his mentee Sabina Coan walk with me across the street to see it themselves for the first time:
Standing three stories tall near the the intersection of Scott Avenue and Pennington Street, artist Garcia's newest mural, "Paula Verde," celebrates Arizona's state tree while paying tribute to the Sonoran Desert and Tucson's growing identity as a city of public art.
Garcia said the idea began more than a year ago as a painting created for the Southern Arizona Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. As excitement around the artwork grew, so did the opportunity to bring it to a much larger canvas.
"It just kept moving from one opportunity to another," Garcia said. "Now it's here, and I'm still in shock because it's the perfect location."
The mural depicts a woman whose flowing dress transforms into the bright yellow blossoms of a palo verde tree. Garcia named her "Paula Verde," explaining that the Sonoran Desert has always inspired him to imagine a feminine figure representing the region's beauty.
But bringing that vision to life has been anything but simple.
The mural stretches roughly 30 feet high by 35 feet wide across the side of a downtown parking garage. What initially looked like a project that might take a couple of weeks quickly became a much larger undertaking once Garcia began scaling the artwork to the side of the building.
Helping make it happen is Coan, Garcia's mentee and an accomplished artist in her own right, who is assisting with her first major mural.
"We've been working on the tree for about a week, because it's the focal point of the mural," Coan said. "It has to be perfect."
Coan said painting on such a massive scale is unlike working on a traditional canvas.
"You don't really get to see the image while you're working on it," she explained. "You only see it once you step back."
Garcia said the process requires constant adjustments, with artists repeatedly climbing down from the lift to evaluate the mural from across the street before making more changes.
Sometimes those adjustments exceed expectations. Other times, changing a single color means reworking an entire section.
"It's trial and error," Garcia said. "We want to make sure it looks great up close but also from every angle and from a distance."
Beyond the artistic challenges, Garcia said creating a mural of this size also means navigating permits, traffic, summer heat, humidity and long days on a lift.
"We don't want to rush it," Garcia said. "We want to make sure we take our time to give it the quality it deserves."
Garcia also developed a new numbering and grid system specifically for this project, allowing him and Coan to transfer the original artwork to the building with remarkable accuracy. He said the technique worked so well that he'll likely use it again on future murals.
The artist hopes the completed mural will become more than just another photo backdrop.
With Tucson recently launching its inaugural Palo Verde Bloom Festival, Garcia envisions "Paula Verde" becoming a gathering place that celebrates one of Southern Arizona's most iconic trees.
"This is going to be a destination," he said. "It's an honor to celebrate an amazing tree that represents Tucson and the Sonoran Desert."
Garcia expects to finish the mural by mid July. Once complete, visitors will be able to see one of Tucson's newest - and largest - works of public art in the heart of downtown.
