As fans flock to the famous sci-fi, fantasy and comic convention, we skip the event halls in favour of the best of the Californian city´s outdoor lifeHigh above me, traffic rumbled along the San Diego-Coronado Bay Bridge as commuters headed to work. But in Chicano Park, directly beneath the huge, curving structure, life was quieter. I soon realised, though, that this hadn´t always been the case. The park, in Barrio Logan, one of San Diego´s oldest neighbourhoods, is not a conventional urban space, nor is its history straightforward.Adorning the many concrete bridge supports are large, colourful intricate murals - often the work of several artists - that tell the story of the park´s controversial creation, as well as conveying defiant slogans and mythical images with resonance to the Mexican-American community. The city´s Chicano population (a chosen identity for some Mexican-Americans) saw Barrio Logan affected by freeway building in the early 1960s, with families forced out during construction of the bridge, which was completed in 1969. Continue reading...
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