Ruben Alcantar Will Paint Mural In Black Cat Alley

Black Cat Alley. Photo taken June 30, 2023 by Sophie Bolich.

The East Side Business Improvement District (BID) has selected Milwaukee artist Ruben Alcantar to paint a new mural in Black Cat Alley.

In August, the BID put out an open call for artists to create a new mural in the alley, which is a street art installation running north and south between E. Kenilworth Place and N. Ivanhoe Place on the city’s East Side.

The alley sits behind well-known East Side establishments, including the Oriental Theatre, and has become locally famous and a popular destination to visit in the neighborhood. The alley runs into the bustling North Avenue commercial district and has hosted live music on several occasions this summer. The BID was looking for an eight-foot by 10-foot mural concept and offered a $1,600 commission for the project. Alcantar was chosen by a panel of seven panelists from a pool of 100 artists who submitted ideas for a new mural.

Alcantar is a local tattoo artist with the Black Rabbit Tattoo Collective and a prolific muralist in Milwaukee. He contributed to several social justice murals in 2020, including one depicts Dontre Hamilton in a larger mural centered on George Floyd, another made of portraits of local activists and, perhaps most notably, one that depicts the participation of Milwaukee Bucks players, including Giannis Antetokounmpo, in a march. He was also commissioned by Jack Daniel’s and the Milwaukee Bucks to paint a mural on the city’s south side to promote Jack Daniel’s Tennessee Honey whiskey.

Black Cat Alley was created in 2016 by community members, artists and the local BID in partnership with Wallpapered City, and it has featured 21 murals by 42 local and international artists.

Alcantar will begin painting the mural on Sept. 5. The BID is hosting an “Ice Cream Social” on Sept. 14 where attendees can “meet the artist behind Black Cat Alley’s newest mural.”