84The Mariachis of El Charro Tapatio
Day of the Dead patio wall painted by Tony Bryant · skeleton mariachis, a dancer in folklórico dress, sugar skulls and roses on black · North 17th Street · Bryant also painted the suspension-bridge wall at Harold Waite’s (stop 118) · year unknownMURAL
A covered patio painted black, and on it a skeleton mariachi band, a dancer mid-turn, and roses the size of dinner plates.
Tony Bryant shows up more than once on this trail, and this is his loudest wall. The patio at El Charro Tapatio is painted black end to end, which is the right call — on black, every color reads at full strength after dark, when the patio is actually full.
On it: EL CHARRO TAPATIO hand-lettered across the top, three skeleton mariachis in charro suits and sombreros working a guitar and a guitarrón, a skeleton woman turning in a folklórico dress with the skirt caught mid-swing, sugar skulls wearing flowers, and big pale blue and orange roses with marigolds filling the gaps. It is Day of the Dead iconography used the way it is meant to be used — not spooky, festive. The dead are at the party.
If you have already been to Harold Waite’s and seen the syrup pouring over the suspension bridge, that is the same painter. Different register entirely, same confidence with a brush.
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