My Heart

Anyone who's known me for more than five minutes knows about my ties to Deep Ellum, the entertainment district on the east side of downtown Dallas. Here's a pretty cool video on the musical history and legacy of the area, and BTW it features my dear friend Broose's band pop poppins from back in the day.

Then again, I guess the whole video could be someone's version of 'back in the day', as it juxtaposes the 20's and 30's with the early 90's. And of course there's a lot more to the full history, but this is a really great start.

Another part of Deep Ellum that has faded is the tunnel. For decades, it was one of the main entry's to DE, a gateway, if you were driving south off I-35 or Central Expwy. You gotta go thru the tunnel to get to DE. Well, you did. They're filling it in now, to make way for a mass transit rail line. Actually, it's probably all filled in and re-routed by now. What a bummer.

Not that I object to mass transit routes to DE. I'm all for folks getting easy access, altho' the area is now but a shadow of it's former and former and former selves. But, as is typical of Dallas, they've torn down the history to make way for progress.

Oddly, Dallas has yet to convince anyone it's a progressive city.

Every few years my bud Frank would orchestrate Tunnel Visions, an artist project to re-do the walls leading in and out of the tunnel with new murals by local artists. It was a PR thing to draw attention not just to Deep Ellum, but to all the artists who had their start there, or who had made an impact in the area. Just so happened that for one of those re-do's I was Marketing Director of the Deep Ellum Association, so I (barely) helped Frank out in the organization and execution of one of the Tunnel Vision projects. This video gives a montage of all the work done during the various Tunnel Visions, of which, at the time of the filming, there must have been at least three that had taken place over the years, and there's been one more since the video. Don't ask me about the music bed because it does not represent DE at all, but in the end, I'm grateful that at least someone had the foresight to document what I suppose can be referred to as the Era of the Tunnel. Much of what is depicted some might consider graffitti, but I would argue it should be recognized as street art. Other depictions are genuine fine art, in my opinion. Maybe some of it is in-between, but that's exactly the point and the beauty of it. As with all art, the work was there for all entering Deep Ellum to view and then to enjoy/interpret/judge for themselves. As with Deep Ellum itself.

Especially because now the tunnel is no more. Making way for progress.