The arroyo mural project is finally dedicated, a botanical sculptor reveals his latest project, a partial lunar eclipse is on its way, a spreading social phenomenon is coming to town and registration is open for the 2027 writers’ conference. Read on about some of the many community activities happening in and around San Miguel de Allende this month.
Mural project dedicated along the Las Cachinches Arroyo
A dozen new large-scale murals were dedicated Aug. 1 along 90 meters of the Las Cachinches Arroyo just west of Calzada de la Aurora and across from Fábrica La Aurora.
The mural corridor project, coordinated by Audubon de México, was designed to transform the previously neglected area into an open-air gallery celebrating the arroyo’s history, ecology and enduring presence.
“A lot of people don’t even know it’s there,” said Audubon de México President April Gaydos. “It will be a lovely green place for people to walk.”
Gaydos emphasized that the area is often “tagged” with graffiti, and that “murals are a deterrent for tagging.” She added, “There have been studies done on this. It’s educational as much as creating a place people want to visit.”
See the Audubon de México website for additional details about the project and the artists and sponsors who participated.
Regular cleanup efforts are also taking place along the Las Cachinches Arroyo. Volunteers have spent their Saturdays hauling out a large amount of garbage from between Calzada de la Aurora and Canción de India.
This work is being organized by Colectiva Ecología en la Montaña with coordination by Gabriel González and Juanita Nolasco. For more information or to donate to the arroyo cleanup project, email arroyocachinches@gmail.com.
Botanical sculptures combine wood, plants and metal
“Rooted in Rust” is former landscape designer Matt Wilson’s latest artistic project. The work combines reclaimed iron relics, wood and succulent plants in permanent botanical sculptures.
“For 1,000 years, you’ve seen a single plant in a pot,” Wilson told Mexico News Daily. “Mine is a single composition with color, with a filler plant, and everything that hangs out of the pot is called the spiller. Those make up the criteria, and they’re very attractive, and nobody else is doing that in San Miguel.”
Wilson hails from San Diego and lived in the San Francisco Bay Area for 40 years. He then moved to Costa Rica for four years and relocated to the Los López area south of San Miguel about 3.5 years ago. He started creating the Rooted in Rust sculptures last year.
“My girlfriend asked me, ‘Can you do something with this metal suitcase?’ and I laughed, and I said, ‘Of course, what do you want?’ So I came up with this succulent, which were unfamiliar to me, and there are thousands of succulents,” he said.
Wilson said the plants grew quickly, and in six months, the result was a “very nice” sculpture.
“I saw there was something there, and it really engaged my creative side,” he said. “I went out and bought an old rusted inner spring mattress, an old rusted tricycle with no rubber on the tires and an old Coca-Cola cooler. I put on an exhibition, and people said, ‘Oh, that’s great,’ and it just went from there.”
More images of Wilson’s work can be seen here.
Partial lunar eclipse coming later this week
The partial lunar eclipse starting Thursday night and ending early Friday morning is expected to be visible from San Miguel. The penumbral eclipse will begin about 7:23 p.m. Thursday in the east-southeast and reach maximum eclipse about 10:12 p.m., creating a reddish-orange effect known as an “almost blood moon.”
A lunar eclipse happens when the Earth moves directly between the sun and the moon, casting the Earth’s shadow onto the moon’s surface. They only occur during a full moon when the sun, the Earth and the moon all line up.
Close to 1 billion people in South and North America will be able to fully see the eclipse, while more than 3 billion should be able to view part of the five-hour event. According to NASA, a similar eclipse last occurred on Aug. 16, 2008, and the next one will be on Sept. 7, 2044.
Ready for an ‘Aura Farming Battle’ this Sunday?
It’s possible to observe the social phenomenon of “aura farming” on Sunday at 3 p.m. at Parque Juarez on the small basketball courts. The prize is 500 pesos.
Aura farming is a trend that started on TikTok and Instagram and consists of young participants silently making moves designed to appear confident and cool without seeming deliberate. The audience’s response decides who wins.
Aura farming battles have been spreading throughout Mexico, with recent ones occurring in Mexico City, Veracruz and Coahuila. Additional gatherings have been reported in Argentina, Brazil, Peru and Bolivia.
Writers’ Conference registration discount ending soon
The San Miguel Writers’ Conference and Literary Festival is offering $95 off its registration packages until Aug. 31. The regular prices go into effect Sept. 1.
Scheduled for Feb. 10-14, 2027, at the Hotel Real de Minas, the conference will feature keynotes by U.S. authors Amor Towles and Jennifer Finney Boylan, Canadian author Michelle Good and Mexican author Martha Bátiz, along with literary presentations, workshops and many other events.
More information, along with the 2027 conference schedule, bilingual programming and free community events, is available here.
Cathy Siegner is an independent journalist based in San Miguel and Montana. She has journalism degrees from the University of Oregon and Northwestern University.
