Terwilliger "Mystery" Mural Inquiry (Part Two: No mystery technology can't solve)

Mural at St. Mark Presbyterian Church, Portland, OR
Photo: God, LLC

One discouraging aspect of this modern life is the complete lack of mystery. I don't mean those age old mysteries—why are we here? who made the world? who made the guy who made the world? why does stuff come wrapped in that inpenetrable hard plastic that cuts the consumer when he tries to open it with scissors? No, I'm referring instead to those little curiosities, those "mysteries" the solving of which, in a pre-google, pre-smartphone world, required a phone call, an appointment, an interview—a brush with fellow man wherein a lead was captured demanding that you shimmy down that rabbit's hole into the very den of secrets where your little mystery was kept. Or at least a trip to the library was in order.

But alas, the problem with the direction of technology is that we are soon to inhabit a world scrubbed of all mystery. A world where information flows like water—actually quite unlike water, or anything else for that matter. Sure to be evermore accessible, evermore complete, we will soon find ourselves merged with it—we will interface with it—control it with our eye movements, or quite possibly with our very minds.

We've all by now experienced the humble beginnings of this likely future—among friends, or around the dinner table perhaps. In the course of conversation you've run into a snag because you can't remember what it's called when you trim shrubs into nifty shapes for ornament, and all you can do is say, "You know, like Edward Scissorhands," but no one is quite on your page, so you have the thought to google it, and sure enough, the word you couldn't think of was "topiary."

Talk about outboard memory potential.

With these luddite views of mine in tow, I set out to discover the meaning of the St. Mark's Presbyterian Church mural—the old fashioned way, without the help of Google's search engine.

I embarked the first day on foot, wrapped in a scarf, with my Rite Aid Ray-Ban's and some fingerless gloves (I was otherwise presentable, as these were all accessories I could shed before I made my introduction). For all my romantic talk of the pursuit of mystery, my plan was dumbly simple: walk to the church and see if anyone there could answer my questions about the mural. I had a pocket-sized spiral notebook and a good pen.

Strike one came in the form of a daycare volunteer. She apparently was merely a volunteer at the daycare that resides below the church, and really knew nothing about the mural, despite its towering dominion just feet above her place of volenteerdom. I then was reminded that the church complex was home to two organizations, St. Mark's Presbyterian Church and P'nai Or of Portland, a Jewish community center. The daycare, I believe, is associated with P'nai Or, though I'm not sure of that.

Regardless, the gal at the daycare new nothing and suggested I talk with the people upstairs. Aha! My first lead.

This should have been helpful, but there were no other cars in the parking lot, and indeed, no other church personel to flag down. I headed back to my house, a touch deflated that "things hadn't just worked out." I nonetheless enjoyed the walk and the fresh air.

Strike two came two days later in the form of another dumb-headed wishful jaunt back to the church. This "detective work," you may have noticed, is part sleuthing, part exercise—and this is exactly what I'm talking about here! The chance to get out in the world and mix yourself with it. Smell the smells, and touch the plants. Notice the progress on the gutting and polishing of that salvaged Airstream trailer you've been coveting seven houses down. Maybe that's just me.

Regardless, the mission was only a success in the above outlined "tangential" sense. My spiral notebook remained un-jotted as the parking lot was, this time, completely empty.

At this point you might be, in your mind, criticizing my methods. Why didn't I just do the legwork to see when someone was gonna be around—look into the church's hours, you know? To my critics, I have no great answer. I'm a shitty detective, is that what you want to hear? Ok. I'm a shitty detective.

And I only proved shittier when on a third day—today in fact—I tried yet again, this time in a drive-by effort, before and after a trip to the bank. I'm starting to wonder when the fuck these people get together anyhow. I'll happily adopt one of their offices if they're not going to use it 3-out-of-5 days of the working week. Anyways, that's all the worked up I got.

Maybe you see where this is headed.

In my defense, I got sick twice this week—that put a slight damper on my motivation and potential to devise better plans. By the time I made today's last-ditch drive-by effort, I had already resigned myself to poking Google if things didn't work out again at the church. Sure enough, when they didn't, I came home and was reminded where my true detective skills lie—in my ability to sniff stuff out online. It wasn't perfectly straight forward, I'll have you know. It took me four or five search formulations and some elementary problem solving to make the discovery (one of the more exhilarating web searches of resent memory!).

First, I discovered the website of the church. Then the name of the mural—"The Vigil of St. Mark." Unfortunately, the link to "Vigil of St Mark Mural" page was broken (I emailed them to fix), so I googled "Vigil of St. Mark Mural" and came up with the artist's name—ESTEBAN CAMACHO STEFFENSEN (I found this neat video of him instructing high school kids in the art of mural-making). At this point, I was close. I found a couple articles that made mention of the mural, but nothing engaging it directly, giving me the full-body analysis I was hoping for. Here and there, I was learning things, for example Esteban is from (or maybe just hails from) Costa Rica. He attended Pacific Northwest College of Art and describes the mural painting process as a sort of performance, where the artist's engagement with onlookers is a vital part of the process.

Anyhow, here's the moment you've maybe been waiting for. I'll go ahead and just link you to the source. It's the announcement of the dedication of the mural, as it appeared in Omnibus, a Presbyterian newsletter, penned by St. Mark's very own pastor, The Rev. Dr. Barbara J. Campbell (If only the good Reverend Doctor knew of my envelope-pushing impracticality in pursuit of her expertise...)

I think the final search phrase ended up being "Esteban Steffensen Camacho, Vigil of St. Mark". In fact, I know it was.

Here's the goods. You'll need to navigate to page 11 for the story.