Nevada’s Neon Museum is installing an 808 square-foot mural honoring diverse communities and individuals who impacted Las Vegas’ cultural history. “Las Vegas Luminaries,” will highlight showgirls, designers, headliners, and civil rights leaders.
Eleven icons will be represented in the museum’s North Gallery. One example is Sammy Davis Jr., the famed African American singer, dancer, actor, comedian, and civil rights activist. He was also known as a member of the Rat Pack.
Another example is Theodora Boyd, an African American showgirl from the Moulin Rouge, and backup dancer for Cab Calloway’s band. Still another is Paul Revere Williams, a Black architect who designed the La Concha Motel. Others include members of the LGBTQ community, as well as the Native American community and the Latino community.
It is being installed by Nanda Sharif-pour and Ali Fathollahi. By next month, it should be completed.
Black History Is Lesser Known
When asked about the project, Frank Rudy Cooper, William S. Boyd Professor of Law and director at UNLV’s Program on Race, Gender & Policing, told Casino.org “This is an important initiative.
Las Vegas is known to be one of the most diverse cities in the U.S.A. That should be reflected in our public art, because art can be both a representation of who we are and an image of where we are heading,” Cooper said.
He adds that promotion of Las Vegas’ diversity is overdue, and Cooper wants to see upper-echelons of Nevada’s corporations to be as diverse as Las Vegas’ population.
In addition, Claytee White, director of the Oral History Research Center at UNLV Libraries, said “This is an important initiative because most Black history is ‘lesser-known’ history. Any attempt to correct this omission is important.
“This new mural will allow us to think in a new way about the place and space of Blacks, Latinx, Asian Americans, Pacific Islanders, Native Americans in our city,” White said.
“This mural will help us understand that the internationally well-known entertainers were not the only people who made history in Las Vegas, and as we look deeper into this wall, we will find all kinds of folks who did amazing things that we don’t know about. We will find people of color all over the place in education, entertainment, art, gaming, city government, business, religious life, and civic and public service, construction, retail, and transportation that we should have known all along.”
She, too ,agrees more needs to be done to honor the contributions of the diverse communities of Las Vegas.
“We are a diverse city in numbers, but not in service to those numbered. We take the credit for being the most diverse city, the most diverse school system, the most diverse whatever you happen to be counting. But local and state governments, businesses, and school systems are just beginning to be spheres of those people, by those people, for those people.”
Underrepresented Heroes, Communities
“The Neon Museum is committed to telling the stories of Las Vegas’ underrepresented heroes and communities,” added Aaron Berger, Neon Museum’s executive director. “While no wall is large enough to include everyone, this mural will beautifully celebrate some lesser-known stories of our city’s history and encourage dialogue.”
As of 2019 statistics, the total population of Nevada by race/ethnicity broke down to 48.2 percent white, Hispanic at 29.2 percent, 9.3 percent black, American Indian/Alaska Native at 0.9 percent, and Asian/Pacific Islander at 8.9 percent.
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