When Robin McArdle-Landers drove in to work earlier this week, her stomach lurched when she saw what vandals had done to the mural outside the Armory Park Senior Center.
Someone had smeared paint across the colorful mural, which teens had worked on as a tribute to the community and Downtown Tucson's history.
Particularly offensive to McArdle-Landers, the senior center's supervisor, was a blotch of paint smeared across the face of a 101-year-old member of the center who recently died.
The vandalism didn't make sense to her, she said.
"Even graffiti artists honor other people's artwork," she said.
Teens from Tucson's arts in reality program painted the mural under the supervision of Rocky Martinez. The youths talked with members of the center to make sure their vision matched what the center, at 220 S. Fifth Ave., wanted to have outside its walls.
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About 17 youngsters, ranging in age from 13 to 20, worked on the mural, Martinez said. It will probably take about a week and more than $100 worth of paint to restore it.
The tagging isn't even legible, Martinez said. It's just "senseless destruction" to a mural that hadn't even been fully completed, he said.
But the cost of the damage isn't what most bothered the senior center's staffers, McArdle-Landers said.
"These young people are very talented and they did a wonderful job," she said.
The mural is accented with hues of pink and orange, depicting a sunset behind the Tucson Mountains. Cacti bunch on one side of the mural. Prominently featured in another part is 101-year-old Adele Gribbell, who died at the end of March.
"She was a very vibrant, compassionate person who lived a very purposeful life," McArdle-Landers said.
Gribbell's love of folk dancing kept her with the senior center for decades, she said. As youngsters from the arts in reality program painted the mural, the senior center decided to ask them to add a tribute to Gribbell.
The 101-year-old was able to see her portrait before she died, and she beamed when she saw what the teens had painted, McArdle-Landers said.
"She was very proud of it," she said. "She told her family members so they could come and look at it."
Daniel Aragon, 17, worked on the mural. He said he never met Gribbell, but he painted some of the red flowers that surround her portrait. He said it felt good to create something that would benefit the community.
He and another teenager who painted the mural fumed, to think that someone would carelessly damage their work.
"We took so much time putting detail into the picture, and then someone goes and just scribbles all over it," he said.
Jonathan Alcala, 18, also helped paint the mural. He said it was the first mural he ever worked on, and it offended him that someone would damage their artwork.
Aragon said he'd definitely help restore the mural, but he didn't understand why the vandalism happened in the first place.
"Why destroy a beautiful piece of artwork with just scribbles?" he said.
'Senseless destruction'
