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 Lima's arts community was incensed. And suspicious: The
yellow paint covering the works evoked the hallmark color of the
new mayor's political party.
On Wednesday, after a third mural turned yellow, Mayor Luis
Castaneda confirmed his government was behind the effort,
literally covering up the traces of a predecessor who had
welcomed the pieces.
"They don't go with the historic center," Castaneda said in a
televised news briefing on Wednesday, shrugging off criticism.
The now-deleted murals were painted in Lima's gritty downtown
district during the 2011-2014 term of former Mayor Susana
Villaran, Castaneda's archrival, whose government helped secure
permits.
The dispute has touched a nerve in Lima, where an emerging arts
scene often struggles for space as rents rise in the
fast-growing city of 10 million.
Castaneda, a conservative and populist leader, said erasing the
artwork was merely part of his government's bid to revamp the
historic center.
But that plan might now backfire, said 36-year-old designer and
arts advocate Elliot Urcuhuaranga.
"It's an invitation for taggers and graffiti artists to cover
downtown Lima in paint," Urcuhuaranga said. "That's what they're
going to do."
The controversy has already inspired a slew of memes and
caricatures online. One depicts the Mona Lisa covered in yellow
paint.
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Castaneda said his government would paint over more murals,
including one he said was linked to the political arm of the nearly
defunct Shining Path insurgency.
Castaneda beat Villaran by a landslide in municipal elections last
year after branding the center-left politician as elitist and
out-of-touch.
Villaran had emphasized expanding cultural programs and cracking
down on Lima's unruly transportation sector, plans she says
Castaneda is working to reverse.
Also mayor from 2003 to 2010, Castaneda has said he wants to use his
new term to resume the kind of public works projects that he said
Villaran abandoned.
Lima, a nearly 500-year-old city founded by Spanish conquistador
Francisco Pizarro on the Pacific coast, is the traffic-choked
capital of Peru. Its sprawling shantytowns lack basic services like
water and electricity.
(Reporting by Mitra Taj; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn)
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