SACRAMENTO, Calif. — For over sixty years, the Second Avenue freeway underpass was a gray concrete reminder of the 1960s Highway 99 construction project, which divided wealthier Curtis Park from Oak Park.

As happened in many predominantly Black and brown neighborhoods in the 1950s and 1960s, the freeway project sliced through the area, exacerbating socioeconomic inequality.

“This underpass has always been a kind of a portal between the haves and the have-nots, “ said Michael Stone, who lives a few yards from the underpass on the Curtis Park side of Second Avenue.

Today, with cultural events like the Sacramento Black Cowboy Festival held in McClatchy Park and a wildly popular bakery with the foodie crowd, Oak Park is evolving. Still, the neighborhood struggles with crime and blight.

Stone and other residents say that a Caltrans program designed to improve neighborhoods around freeways, especially those with socioeconomic challenges, has brought a ray of color and hope.

The transformation of the once bleak passageway began in August. One hot evening, a group of artists arrived with a projector, casting an image onto one side of the underpass. Using the projected image as a guide, they began painting an ambitious mural.

The result was a colorful series of images, ranging from African Kente cloth designs to soaring Asian-inspired cranes to a semicircle of Native Americans. José Lott, who led the project and has painted murals in Sacramento for 40 years, masterminded the design.

“We wanted to capture the spirit of as many cultures that call this area home as we could,” Lott said.

Along with Lott, artists Shonna McDaniels, Henry Fisk, Gustavo Reynoso, and Andy Cohen contributed to the mural.

“When I think about Oak Park, and I think about Curtis Park, I think about this freeway as a prime example of some communities that really were separated and had two very different outcomes over time,” said City Councilwoman Catie Maple, who represents the neighborhood.

“What better way to celebrate and connect those communities through really beautiful art,” Maple said at a ribbon cutting last week.

Most of the Second Avenue mural funding came from Clean California, a $1.2 billion effort led by Caltrans to beautify public spaces near freeways across California. The Oak Park Community Association hosted community engagement sessions to get feedback on the mural design. Sacramento’s Office of Arts and Culture and the non-profit Sol Collective also provided support.

Lott grew up in the California border town of Calexico, although it felt like Mexico to Lott. “I only remember hearing Spanish as a kid.”

Fate brought Lott to Sacramento in 1982, when he received a scholarship awarded to gifted offspring of farmworkers. He then studied studio art and graphic design at Sacramento State.

At Sac State, Lott forged an enduring connection with the legendary muralist, poet, and founder of an artist movement called the Royal Chicano Air Force, José Montoya.

Montoya founded the artist collective to support Cesar Chavez’s United Farm Workers and to celebrate Mexican-Americans’ Indigenous roots. The group was initially named the Rebel Chicano Art Front. When some confused the artist organization’s acronym, RCAF, with the Royal Canadian Air Force, the name was humorously changed to the Royal Chicano Air Force.

RCAF murals can still be found in Sacramento, including one on the South Side Park bandshell, painted in 1977. Montoya created an iconic panel featuring Mexican revolutionary heroes Pancho Villa and Emiliano Zapata mingling on a street corner with contemporary Chicanos.

Decades later, it’s Lott mentoring mural artists through the Washington Neighborhood Center, a community organization that supports Chicano culture and Art in Sacramento. “José is very gentle, but he is a fierce artist, and it’s an honor to learn from and to work with him,” said Henry Fisk, who spent two months bringing the Second Avenue mural to life

Fisk, a UC Davis Studio art graduate who goes by the name “Fisko” in his work, called the Second Avenue underpass mural project a “dream come true.”

Fisk grew up in Oak Park and recalls passing beneath the underpass countless times on his skateboard to visit his girlfriend Sophie, who lived in Curtis Park. They are still together. “We’ve been together for 17 years. It’s gratifying and surreal to be a part of something so significant that will leave its mark for years to come.“

A game of peek-a-boo

Another nearby mural also received support from a Clean California grant. Muralist Jaya King’s bold mural spans both sides of the underpass on 21st Avenue, bringing vivid color to a neighborhood of tire shops and Mexican grocery stores.

King drew inspiration for her project by immersing herself in the North City Farms and South Oak Park neighborhoods, where she attended community association meetings and local church services and visited local schools.

The Sacramento-based muralist incorporated nearby school mascots and a vibrant orange monarch butterfly. A magenta oak tree represents Oakridge Elementary School. There’s a dragon for Ethel Phillips Elementary. And a falcon represents Christian Brothers High School.

King painted two large children’s faces on each side of the underpass.

“I wanted to connect with the two kids’ portraits across the street as if they’re playing peek-a-boo with each other. To me, this is an important element that can get the kids excited to get to go through the tunnel,” King said in an online video.

The artist said one of the most gratifying parts of the project was a community painting day in July 2023, when hundreds of people helped paint.

She also said it was inspiring to gather ideas from the community. “When you get community feedback, it’s really like a firehose. I asked for the firehose.”

King said that as part of the “firehose” of ideas, she incorporated the symbolic language of Russian embroidery into her mural, the importance of quilting in African American history, and intricate Hmong-inspired designs.

Before the highway

Michael Stone, the closest neighbor to the Second Avenue mural, remembers the area before the freeway was constructed in the early 1960s.

Stone grew up in Sacramento, joined the Navy, and traveled the world as an engineer on nuclear submarines. After traveling the globe, he retired to his hometown and lives in what was once his grandmother’s house.

As a boy, he remembers the freeway rising next door to his grandmother’s home, forever altering the neighborhood. Even before the mural arrived, Stone saw the need to improve the area. With Caltrans’s permission, he planted a few fruit trees along the freeway embankment.

Stone acknowledges that the mural is not a magic bullet. Shortly after the project was completed, two RVs pulled up alongside the mural wall and stayed for several weeks. A few tents also popped up. Passing along the sidewalk became challenging.

The city’s community response department convinced the RVs to find another place to park. “I think the area is heading in the right direction. The mural definitely helps.”

Mural artist Fisk believes improving the neighborhood is a long-term process. He has heard that additional lighting to make the underpass more inviting at night is in the works.

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