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County Collection

San Pedro Service Center

San Pedro Reflections

Click for larger photos

Project Description

The San Pedro Service Center has provided educational, social, and recreational services for its surrounding community for over three decades. These services include emergency food distribution, computer training classes, a nutrition program, and assistance for seniors to obtain social security, health care, and affordable housing.  In order to help continue the Center’s mission, it was recently renovated and expanded. 

As part of this renovation project, artist Carlos Callejo was commissioned to create a mural for the Center’s exterior.  The artist hand painted the mural over several months while the Center was fully operational so that users and visitors to the Center were able to observe the artist’s process.

The artist describes the mural as “a combination of the history of San Pedro with what the center represents.” Callejo creates art to promote community interaction — he believes the theme of the artwork should be less about his singular interpretation of San Pedro and more about the many interpretations of the people who live here. Therefore, Callejo spent some time at the center talking to community members, based on their input he included iconic images of San Pedro such as the Vincent Thomas Bridge, cannery workers, the Angel’s Gate Lighthouse and the Port of LA and its workers. The mural also features a woman dancing accompanied by a man playing guitar to reflect the center’s popular dance classes.

Click here to watch an interview with artist Carlos Callejo

About the Artist

Carlos Callejo, who lives and works in San Pedro, has over thirty years experience designing, directing, and coordinating public art projects.  He has created dozens of public artworks, including murals he painted for the Smithsonian Institution’s Festival of American Folk Life in Washington, D.C., the Silver City Tourist and Visitors’ Bureau, and the El Paso County Courthouse’s atrium.  His work takes inspiration from the great muralists of post-revolutionary Mexico and he frequently creates art that combines historical and mythic imagery.

Carlos studied art at California State University and the Otis Art Institute, and he received a Lila Wallace-Reader’s Digest Fund Arts International grant to study the history and production of murals in Italy.