Category: San Antonio Parks

‘Faux Bois’ Roots Run Deep in San Antonio

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Like remnants of an ancient petrified forest blending in with the urban landscape, San Antonio’s cement artworks, faux bois or trabajo rustico, are cherished landmarks.  The rough “bark” of the old trolley stop near Central Market in Alamo Heights; the covered bridge in Brackenridge Park; and the entrance to the Japanese Tea Garden has been rubbed to a sheen by the exploring hands of generations of San Antonio’s children.

The craft of creating trabajo rustico sculptures could have been lost for San Antonio following the deaths of Dionicio Rodriguez and Maximo Cortes, but fortunately Maximo’s son, Carlos Cortes, inherited both the secret formulas and the talent to continue to add prominent public artwork throughout the city.  Carlos installed a graceful “cypress” bursting through the ceiling in the middle of the San Antonio Children’s Museum; built the Treehouse for the Witte Museum; added a trellis to the River Walk; recently completed the massive Grotto for the river’s Museum Reach; and installed benches in a pocket park.

Carlos Cortes’ cypress tree seems to grow through the ceiling of the San Antonio Children’s Museum.
Private donations garnered by the San Antonio River Foundation funded Carlos Cortes’ fanciful grotto along the Museum Reach of the San Antonio River Walk.
Carlos Cortes

San Antonio’s connections to the art form of trabajo rustico are explored during an exhibit and related symposium, both part of the celebration of Historic Preservation Month.  The Tradition of Trabajo Rustico:  Fantasies in Cement can be viewed in the Russell Hill Rogers Lecture Hall in the Navarro Campus of the Southwest School of Art and Craft through May 30.

Speakers at the symposium on the morning of Saturday, May 15, include Patsy Pittman Light, author of Capturing Nature:  The Cement Sculpture of Dionicio Rodriguez.  Following a box lunch, there will be a bus tour of some of San Antonio’s faux bois landmarks and a demonstration by Cortes at his studio.

The morning session is admission-free.  The fee for lunch and the afternoon bus tour is $25.  For more information, telephone the San Antonio Conservation Society, 210-224-6163.

January 16, 2013, Update: San Antonio’s faux bois art and artists are featured on KLRN ARTS.

Let the Alamo Guardians Retaliate

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No official comments from the Daughters of the Republic of Texas have been submitted to any of the posts about The Alamo on this blog; so it seems only fair to share their official stance on diverse topics with readers.  Sort of an equal-time kind of thing. 

This way to give the custodians of The Alamo their opportunity to vent about attacks against them in the media is courtesy of The Alamo Wake-Up Call Channel on YouTube.

May 13 Update:  “Another Battle Brews at The Alamo”

June 18 Update:  “DRT Now Under State Investigation”; Attorney General Gregg Abbott’s Request to Examine DRT; related editorial; and Alamo without Director

June 23 Update:  Reports on the saga continue:  “Hopefully, we will be successful in narrowing the scope and extending the time window, as DRT is in the middle of gathering information for our upcoming audit,” Atkins wrote.

July 1 Update:  Editorial pointing out the Alamo’s cracked roof as symbolic of the DRT’s problems.

Update on October 19:  John Branch editorial cartoon:

Guarding the Guardians

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Reporter Scott Huddleston of the San Antonio Express-News dropped this gem near the end of his story about the Daughters of the Republic of Texas efforts to trademark “The Alamo:”

Along with the “Allies” campaign, which raises money for Alamo preservation, operations and educational programs, the DRT hopes to collect funds for a new library building on the grounds that eventually could stand seven stories high.

Seven stories high?  And I have been blogging over a banner blocking the entrance to the grounds and the pop-up on the plaza?

Surely San Antonio’s viewshed ordinance protects us from these guardians in need of guarding: 

The purpose of a Viewshed Protection district is to establish regulations to protect, preserve, and enhance views and vistas. The City of San Antonio has many views and vistas of historic places, landmark buildings, and other sites of cultural importance which have always been important to the city.  These views will continue to be amenities and assets of great value to the city, its people, and its economy. 

New development in the vicinity of these important places is usually beneficial, but when construction becomes too tall and begins to overwhelm or intrude, in scale and mass, the main view or vista of a smaller place of significance, then the viewshed located behind the significant property should be protected. 

Viewshed Protection districts are overlay districts that will be used primarily for unique situations regarding views and vistas that are not adequately covered by the standard zoning districts.  No part of a new structure, sign, tower, roof top equipment, or other appurtenance shall be permitted to encroach into any designated viewshed as set forth in this ordinance unless an encroachment was approved legally before the effective date of the Viewshed Protection ordinance.  If the maximum height allowed in any zoning district within the city differs from the height permitted by a protection district, the more restrictive height limitation shall apply.

San Antonio currently has one (1) Viewshed Protection district: Alamo Viewshed (VP-1).  This Viewshed Protection district lies behind the main entrance to the front door of the Mission San Antonio de Valero (The Alamo), a local Exceptional Landmark and a National Historic Landmark.  A brass disc monument named VP-1, Alamo Viewshed, has been set to mark the viewpoint origination in Alamo Plaza in front of the Alamo Chapel….
(see Ch. 35-337 of the Unified Development Code for full boundary description).

If not, fix it quickly.

May 13 Update:  “Another Battle Brews at The Alamo”

June 1 Update:  The Texas Historical Commission’s response to DRT’s plans:  page 1, page 2 and page 3

October 28 Update:  The Daughters of the Republic of Texas are only $40 million away from building a three-story addition to the Alamo grounds….