‘I felt kind of angry:’ El Paso artist reacts to Segundo Barrio mural disappearing
EL PASO, Texas (KVIA) – A Segundo Barrio mural honoring Hispanic heritage has been painted over. The mural -- which stood on the side of a clothing store at 701 S El Paso St. -- disappeared three years after its creation.
El Paso native Kelsey Kilcrease painted the mural. She said it made a difference to the people that lived in the community.
"We had so many people that would walk by every day and just tell us, either in English or in Spanish, just how meaningful it was to have something that felt just like it honored their culture, and that they loved that their neighborhood was being brightened up," Kilcrease said.
She said it was her favorite mural to work on because of its impact.
Now, there's a blank space left where the piece she worked so hard on used to be.
Kilrease found out about her mural's disappearance through an artist who painted to the right of it, Adrian Lopez. Lopez sent her a video of his mural intact.
To the left was a blank space.
"I immediately just felt, I don't know, I felt weird. I felt sad. I felt kind of angry. And I'd say most of all, I just felt caught off guard. And didn't quite understand what had happened," Kilcrease said.
Kilcrease took to social media to honor the experience she had painting the mural. When scrolling through old photos and videos of the process, she realized her memories and connections will outlast the art.
"I just remembered how meaningful it was. And that to me, like that was what I needed, was just to like, remember the meaning behind it and really what I gained from it. So yeah, I still, I don't know what happened or who did it. And I'm getting to a place where I think that's okay," Kilcrease said.
Kilcrease was one of four artists recruited for the SHEIN X Art Discover Project during Hispanic Heritage Month in 2023. SHEIN, a clothing company, commissioned several El Paso artists to paint murals, including Kilcrease and Lopez.
During the process, the two formed a special bond.
"Our art artistic styles just messed really well. Our personalities meshed, and we decided to just merge our murals into one big image to like, just really look celebratory and colorful," Kilcrease said.
She said they only had four days to complete the mural after sanding down the wall.
Kilcrease is based in Albuquerque now, but she is originally from El Paso. The mural was a way for her to reconnect with her home.
"I'll always have a special place in my heart for El Paso and its people. And since I had moved away for school and whatnot, it was just nice to like, feel that reconnection and to feel really like rooted and grounded with that mural," Kilcrease said.
Kilcrease based the mural off an image of her baby sister, someone she said she uses as her muse in a lot of her artwork.
"When I was contacted about painting the mural, and the prompt was, you know, to paint something celebratory for Hispanic Heritage Month, I don't know, I just thought, like, I think it'd be great to just, you know, paint my sister, who to me is like a symbol of our family, of being proud, being Hispanic and just joyful," Kilcrease said.
Kilcrease said her and her sister were both sad about what had happened, but surprised to see all of the support from the community on her Instagram post. People told her walking by the mural every day brightened their day.
"It just like it made me feel happy. And so, like, I'll be sad that it's gone now. While it is a sad sentiment, it made me feel nice that like it was still causing like a positive impact," Kilcrease said.
ABC-7 reached out to SHEIN to ask why the mural was painted over.
Kilcrease said she chooses to believe who ever did it didn't have bad intentions, and doesn't want them to be targeted for it.
In the future, Kilcrease said she hopes to paint another mural again and collaborate with Lopez.
