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Students reflecting Phoenix’s Latino past

If you want to see the Mexican history of Phoenix through the eyes and hearts of the young, scoot on over to the Phoenix Museum of History before July 31. The museum is displaying students’ work from “El Espejo After School,” a year-long artist residency at Paul Laurence Dunbar Elementary. Artist Joe Shetler helped the kids create a four-panel mural about Mexican history in Phoenix using historic photos from the El Espejo exhibit currently running through the end of the year. Dunbar students painted famous Mexican Phoenicians such as Trinidad Escalante Swilling, La Madre de Phoenix, and the late Silvestre Herrera, Medal of Honor winner. One student, Jasmine Parker, was proud to paint history. “I helped to paint the I.S. Espinoza Grocery Store, which represents the Mexican American businesses in Phoenix,” she says. Beginning in August, the mural will be on permanent display at Dunbar Elementary School. The art and exhibit – as well as a four-part series published in Latino Perspectives in 2007 (www.latinopm.com) – was based on a Hispanic historical properties survey commissioned by the City of Phoenix.