Time: September 27th, 10:00 am
Location: 1st Street Alleyway (behind Cascadia Credit Union)
All ages welcome, no registration required!
Join Tono Cruz (muralist and artist), Cathy English (the curator at the Revelstoke Museums and Archives), Morgan Brewster (the great-great-grandson of Mercedes Matz) for an artist talk about the mural going up in the alleyway!
About the project:
Italian Artist Tono Cruz has flown in from Italy to paint this mural. The work depicts Revelstoke resident Mercedes “Mary” Catolino Matz.
Mercedes “Mary” Catolino Matz (also recorded as Maria Mercede Catolino), was an Italian immigrant and longtime resident of Revelstoke. She was born in Italy on March 12, 1870, and died in Revelstoke on September 20, 1934, at the age of 64.
While historical records about Mercedes herself are limited, one published historical account identifies her specifically as a trained midwife and states that she delivered almost all of the Italian babies in the district.
Midwives were particularly important members of communities during this period, providing specialized knowledge and support during pregnancy and childbirth at a time when access to hospitals and physicians was more limited than it is today.
This aspect of Mercedes’ story is an important reason for choosing her as the subject of the mural. Rather than simply depicting an Italian immigrant because of her heritage, the project seeks to highlight an individual who represents the contributions, relationships, and often-overlooked roles that immigrant women played in building Revelstoke’s early communities. Her story also creates an opportunity to recognize the women whose work was essential to community life but whose histories are less extensively documented in local archives.
The mural will therefore serve as a visual acknowledgment of Revelstoke’s Italian history while drawing attention to an individual whose story has largely remained outside of the better-known historical narratives of the city.
