The Thinkers : Mural at 4th Ave & 6th St

The Thinkers : Mural at 4th Ave & 6th St

 

Eleanor Kohless painted this mural, The Thinkers”, in 1996, capturing some of the locales in a street scene.  On the bus, you can see Stella, a tapdancing chainsmoking 70-year-old.  Behind the fancy but real city bus stop, the guy playing his violin atop his unicycle is Hillbilly Willy.  Beano, the dog, has din-din on his mind.

Dennis bangs his washtub and strums his box guitar. Betsy was a walking “human jukebox” singing ballads for $1.  Others were tourists or ordinary folk who happened to wander by while the muralist was painting.  There goes a roller skating mama.  Some of those picture are fictional.

When people walked by, Kohloss would ask them what they were thinking to incorporate it into the mural.  Almost everyone is thinking about something like the little girl thinking of ice cream. One woman is thinking of a cat which is thinking of a cat.

On a side note, I like that the city tried to make a pretty bus stop — but I wish they could have put the bus stop a few feet eastward against the next blank building wall so it isn’t in front of the mural.  Oh well.

References:

Tucson Oddity: Mural recalls 4th Ave.’s quirky denizens
by Carol Ann Alaimo, Arizona Daily Star, May 14, 2012

The Thinkers, mural by Eleanor Kohless
4th Avenue and 6th Street, Tucson, Arizona

Comedy Plus hosts Awww Mondays.  Post a picture that makes you say Awww!  I thought there were a lot of cute vignettes in the mural for my entry.  Hope you have the time to visit some of the other folks.

 

9 Replies to “The Thinkers : Mural at 4th Ave & 6th St”

  1. How cool. Love this. I always enjoy street art. Not graffiti (around here it’s all gang stuff), but street art. It’s the flavor of he area.

    Have a fabulous day. ♥

    1. I love this mural too — such a wonderful cross section of people. Although this one taggers are messing with it — there are two tags on the bus driver which I think is sad.

  2. This is very very interesting and very good, though I am not a big fan of street art. I like the cross section of people and occupations. Is it the Village People–21st Century?! Following on Bloglovin

    1. It does look like that, doesn’t it? Seems that Tucson has it’s fair share of eccentric folks as well.

    1. Me too. Tucson has become a lot more interesting since I’ve started exploring the murals here. I wish I could have seen the tap dancing 70-something-year-old. that must have been something

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