Neighborhood Dispatch: Murals, gender equity talk, and Day of the Dead

There are 10,080 minutes in a week, and we spend most of them trying to cross things off of our never-ending to do lists. So here are some activities that can help you break out of your bubble for a couple of hours, while also getting involved in your local community.

Here’s this week’s neighborhood dispatch.

Ever wonder the story behind Philly murals? In October, Mural Arts Philadelphia is holding happy hours for people to meet the artists behind different murals across the city. For this edition, you can join muralists Christian “Tame Artz” Rodriguez and Bill Strobel, at Yards Brewing, to talk about their upcoming piece “Know The Elements,” a mural that shows the cultural impact of hip hop and the local figures who make up the scene.

💵Free, 📅 Oct. 27, ⌚3- 6 p.m., 📍 500 Spring Garden Street, 📧 RSVP.

On Friday, Angharad Valdivia, a University of Illinois Communications professor and chair of the Latina/Latino Studies program, will be holding a colloquium on “the limits of neoliberal approaches to development, social justice, and intersectional gender equity,” at the University of Pennsylvania.

The conversation will explore the way media (and social media) impacts the intersections of gender, oppression and activism. It will examine the popular documentary, Girls hold up Half the Sky, and the song “Un violador en tu camino,” which became an anthem for women worldwide in 2019 to rally against rape culture, femicide and victim blaming.

Valdivia will hold the conversation through Zoom, but the watch party will be held in Room 500.

💵Free, 📅 Oct. 28, ⌚12:15 p.m.-1:15 p.m., 📍 Annenberg School, 3620, Walnut St. (Room 500), 📧 RSVP.

The Day of the Dead commemorates the life and absence of our loved ones. At Queen Village’s Fleisher Art Memorial, artist Mauricio Pérez will be commemorating this year’s procession through the perspective of his Colombian heritage, through the thematic lens of La Leyenda de El Dorado (The Legend of El Dorado) and La Balsa Muisca, also known as the Muisca raft or Golden Raft of El Dorado, a pre-Columbian artifact created by the indigenous Muisca of Colombia’s Andes.

There will also be a market and fair celebrating Latino and Latinx artisans, starting at 2 p.m. Saturday with the procession beginning at 4 p.m. and the celebration with food and entertainment at 6 p.m. If it rains, the event will move to Sunday.

💵Free, 📅 Oct. 29, ⌚2- 10 p.m., 📍 719 Catharine St., 🌐fleisher.org