Happy Halloween

 These shots are from the annual Piedmont Avenue Halloween Parade.  The street is closed off for several blocks, there's a costume parade in the middle of the street, and local businesses become trick or treat stations that give away candy.

Even the adults get into the spirit.

I'll be out of town for a few weeks and won't be able to leave comments.  

Day of the Dead

Day of the Dead is a big deal in Oakland.  There's a big street festival in the Fruitvale District and the  Oakland Museum sponsors an annual exhibit usually featuring altars created by local artists.  This small wood assemblage was in the Museum gift shop.

But you can find nods to the day everywhere around town.  Like at this summer street fair.

There's a similar logo for the Giants too.  But that's the other side of the Bay.

I'll be out of town for a few weeks, so I won't be able to leave comments.  Sorry.

Monday Mural: Dewey Tucker in memorium

 Dewey Tucker was a jazz guitarist who died in 2010, a victim of mistaken identity by gang members.  This mural was done by the Community Rejuvenation Project.  His killers were tried and convicted earlier this year.

Welcome to Monday Mural:  if you like murals or have a mural you'd like to post, this meme's for you.  Just follow the Linky steps below.  You decide what constitutes a mural.  Once you start looking, you find them everywhere.  Be sure to link back to this blog and visit your fellow posters.  Looking forward to the mural finds posted this week.

Google+ users, please configure your post so we all can leave a comment.  Thanks.

I will be gone for three weeks or so, but the meme will continue to go up on Sundays at 7PM PST.   Sorry, but I'll unlikely be able to leave comments.

remember them

There are four massive bronze sculptures by Mario Chiodo in this Uptown park that highlight moral and social leaders of the world.  It's really hard to take a picture of them to capture size, color, and detail.  These are the best of a bad lot.  Interestingly, there are images 360 degrees around each piece.

Monday Mural: more of the Alice Street mural

Here's another section from the Alice Street mural, first shown last week.  More of Oakland's diversity is celebrated.

Welcome to Monday Mural:  if you like murals or have a mural you'd like to post, this meme's for you.  Just follow the Linky steps below.  You decide what constitutes a mural.  Once you start looking, you find them everywhere.  Be sure to link back to this blog and visit your fellow posters.  Looking forward to the mural finds posted this week.

Google+ users, please configure your post so we all can leave a comment.  Thanks.

another restaurant has opened

The Tribune Tavern is in the old Tribune Tower, former home of the local newspaper.  It is one of many new restaurants that have opened up in the downtown and Uptown areas.  Oakland has become quite the restaurant scene, with even San Francisco chefs coming across the Bay to open a new venture.  I like that in good weather, the windows slide back and voila! you're dining al fresco.

Mandela Parkway memorial

On October 17, 1989 a 7.0 earthquake struck the Bay Area.  While most of the country remembers how it disrupted the World Series and closed the Bay Bridge, locals remember the destruction of the Cypress Structure.  The Cypress was a double deck freeway section running through West Oakland physically dividing the community and bringing incessant noise and chemical pollution.  It was a poor and industrial neighborhood that got little attention or support.  The earthquake caused the freeway to collapse, ultimately killing 42 people.  This simple sculpture, standing on the parkway that replaced the freeway, memorializes that event.

The first responders were neighbors who ran out with every manner of ladder cobbling together scaffolds trying to reach people trapped in their cars.  The air was thick with concrete dust that impeded both light and breathing.  Their bravery and selflessness were incredible.

After much debate and community resistance to a new freeway, it was decided to replace the freeway with a parkway.  So many years later the Mandela Parkway seems a graceful stretch of open sky, sun, and green.  The park that runs down the center of the street goes for several blocks covering the distance of the old freeway.  The day I was there people were driving, walking, biking, and skateboarding down the street and the pathway had runners and bench sitters enjoying the sunny weather.  The community is still poor but now it feels like it's on the upswing.

N is for nap time

It was a hot day and the shade looked so inviting.  Nothing like a little nap to recharge the batteries.  Linked to ABC Wednesday.

Monday Mural: Alice Street mural

This vast mural on Alice Street is across from the Malonga Center for the Arts.  Part of the city Parks and Recreation Department, the center offers classes and a performance stage for performing and visual arts.  While I was snapping this mural an African drumming class was practicing and filled the surrounding streets with an exciting beat.  The mural is by Desi and Peskador of the Community Rejuvenation Project.

Welcome to Monday Mural:  if you like murals or have a mural you'd like to post, this meme's for you.  Just follow the Linky steps below.  You decide what constitutes a mural.  Once you start looking, you find them everywhere.  Be sure to link back to this blog and visit your fellow posters.  Looking forward to the mural finds posted this week.

Google+ users, please configure your post so we all can leave a comment. 

Monday Mural: inside and outside the rabbit

This new mural in the downtown area was completed by Lord Nychos the Weird, a street art group from Vienna.  As near as I can tell Nychos is the primary artist and Lord and the Weird are crews that work with him.  He's done walls all over Europe, South America, and several places in the USA.  It's hard to know what to say about a gigantic dissected rabbit.  There are things about this work I admire, but the creepiness factor is a little too high for my taste.

Welcome to Monday Mural:  if you like murals or have a mural you'd like to post, this meme's for you.  Just follow the Linky steps below.  You decide what constitutes a mural.  Once you start looking, you find them everywhere.  Be sure to link back to this blog and visit your fellow posters.  Looking forward to the mural finds posted this week.

Google+ users, please configure your post so we all can leave a comment.  Thanks.

coming attractions

This wall of advertising announces a new business coming to Broadway.  It's going to be a square block of shopping, living, social gathering, and art spaces all in one complex to be called Hive.  Sounds like the perfect name.

Theme Day: movement

It's the first of the month again, and the City Daily Photo theme is Movement.  Here are a couple of happy little guys at last month's Chinatown Street Fair.  They were ecstatic and wanted to go down again.  Mom said no.  Linked to CDP Theme Day.