{Repost from last year's Jane's Walk}

THIS IS A REPOST FROM LAST YEAR OF GOING ON JANE'S WALK - I'm hoping to participate in some Jane's Walk events this coming weekend.

At the very last minute this weekend, I decided to go on a walk with a bunch of other people to see what is happening in the neighborhood around 16th St and McDowell in Phoenix. 

The walk started around Way Cool Hair and went north to Barrio Cafe. (Have you ever been to Barrio Cafe? I've only been a couple times, but they have some of the best food I have EVER tasted and I can't wait to go back some day soon.  It's the type of place that you would take friends from out of town to give them a unique Arizona food experience.)

Artist Hugo Medina was the main speaker on the tour, with a few other people talking here and there. I didn't catch all that he said, but he was telling great stories and explaining about plans to revitalize the area and....wait....let me see how Calle 16's facebook page describes it.  Ok, they describe it like this:

 Grass roots community effort to fund and promote a community mural project on 16th Street, Phoenix, Arizona. Showcasing the barrio's voice through art/murals. 

Here are some of the images I took along the way.

So, as we were walking along, someone on the tour pointed to the ground and explained that he had been walking along with a geologist friend, who stopped dead in his tracks when he noticed this strange concrete. Something had caused an electrical pole to topple onto the ground (maybe it was hit by a car?) and the heat of the electricity turned the concrete into glass. There's something delightfully sci-fi and kinda scary knowing that concrete can turn to glass like that right there on the city sidewalk.

Here is Hugo Medina, who spoke on the tour.

I would LOVE to paint a mural. I've thought for a long time that I would. One of my favorite classes that I took at ASU when I was getting a degree in Fine Arts/Photography was my Mexican Art History Class and of course we studied murals quite a bit in that class. I actually have tons (tons!) of cans of spray paint left over from an art project I did about 8 years ago. I wonder if the spray paint would even still work. I have this idea that I would like to paint a mural as a backdrop for a portrait session and then use a tilt-shift lens to create a super dreamy effect. I definitely want to do that someday!