The Artistic Landscape of the City by the Bay

By: Angie Santos

The Mission District of San Francisco wears its cultural pride on its sleeve. The streets are skillfully painted with Latinx history, rich in color, and covered in the echoes of a community that once thrived. In the past decade, the Mission District has become a battleground. The Latinx community has been under siege by the ever growing power of gentrification.

Over the years, the Latinx community that resided in the area has been pushed out. Landlords continuously increased rent, taxes soared, and general living expenses skyrocketed. There has been push back from community members, but the city has not passed enough regulations to protect residents. 

Today in the Mission, sleek coffee shops and boujee boutiques clash with the warm strokes of color that line the street walls. Even now while the people who painted them may be gone, the murals remain standing. Though once again colonized, the art rebels and resists through its existence as an act of defiance.