An exhibition allows the muralist to reconnect with a work he helped make at age 14.
All it took was one look.The artists behind a vibrant mural depicting community protection of black youth were a mystery to the folks at UCLA. An image of the work, part of the school’s archive, would eventually grace university publications, including an edition of the museum’s newsletter Fowler Now, but they didn’t know who had painted it.
That’s when Richard Wyatt came upon it.
“The winter newsletter came in the mail one day,” recounted Wyatt, 54. “And there it was. I was like ‘Whoa! Man, that’s our mural.’ “
The “our” refers to Wyatt and his then-“art-partner-in-crime” Guillermo Anderson. Both were commissioned — at age 14 — in 1971 to create the work as part of an outreach program at the school.
The oil-on-canvas work features an outstretched arm presiding over the youth in the image; in another corner is an oversized arm, acting as a shield. A pregnant woman hugging her belly is meant to represent the future.
UCLA Fowler Museum had planned to showcase the work in the exhibition “Art, Activism, Access: 40 Years of Ethnic Studies at UCLA,” on view through mid-June, and hang a sign requesting that anyone with information about the painting contact the Ralph J. Bunche Center for African American Studies. But Wyatt was one step ahead.
“I called the school up, and now I’m getting ready to see it on display again. It’s great,” Wyatt said.
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