Perhaps you've seen a masterpiece by John Santos. You might have liked it.

The artist recently completed the signature mural at the front of Warehouse 21, a teen center in the Santa Fe Railyard, and he was responsible for a profile of Martin Luther King in aerosol paint that graced a wall in Agua Fría early this year. Both projects were 100 percent legal.

Like many graffiti artists, Santos has a story about a run-in with the law that forced him to redirect his energy: He landed in jail in California after he and friends painted 29 train cars. But now Santos, 31, is the kind of positive mentor who stands up to critics of his medium.

During the school year, he conducts workshops four times a week for Ortiz Middle School students who want to learn how to paint and takes his show on the road to area pueblos.

It has been his mission and vocation since he was hired by the Urban Youth Arts Workshop in Richmond, Calif., the community organization he hooked up with when he got in trouble.

Santos said he's grateful to be able to guide young people. "I tell them that if there is an opportunity to get with somebody who already has the experience with the art, to do the legal things. You can get paid. It does not have to be this street thing," he said.

He's a strong supporter of establishing free walls for improvisational painting, of government- and business-approved mural projects. He'd also like to see all the city parks open their walls for that purpose.

By doing art for and with the community, artists become more a part of it. Last month in front of Warehouse 21, Santos reached over his head, sweeping bright blue feathers onto a Chinese-style phoenix. The mural images relate to the teen center's mission, he said. It shows how the youth center has risen from the ashes and raised money to build the new facility.

"Doing this kind of work, it kind of gave me a new perspective that I didn't want to get dropped into that box of being a hip hop artist or a graffiti artist," he said. "It's not about you. You have to work with the community."

It has not been a great couple of years for programs that push graffiti artists toward the right side of the law. Although the city at one time had a thriving youth mural project, the budget for the program is a fraction of what it once was. Free walls that were a mainstay for young painters at Warehouse 21 were inaccessible for about 18 months while the center was homeless.

At least there, the tide is turning. Director Ana Gallegos y Reinhardt said the center, which reopened last month, will soon have a 20-foot-tall, 6- or 8-foot section of free wall and continues its involvement with graffiti-art mentorships and grants for murals.

Sabrina Pratt, director of the Santa Fe Arts Commission, said experience has shown that murals can cut down on illegal tagging and that murals stay relatively unmarred.

During former Mayor Debbie Jaramillo's administration, the city's youth mural project had a budget of more than $108,000, which was used to create artwork on such surfaces as city vehicles and street-corner boxes for traffic-signal equipment. The budget has been about $12,000 a year in recent years because of "reprioritization," she said.

One of the issues under consideration by an anti-graffiti task force is whether the city should increase mural funding again or undertake other education and prevention methods.

Detective Matthew Martinez of the city police department has mixed feelings about mural programs and free walls. During a recent driving tour of some of the local hot spots for graffiti art, the investigator for the city's gang unit complimented Santos' work in Agua Fría.

In another part of town, however, is a city-sanctioned mural that leaves him cold. "This one needs to be painted over," Martinez said as he walked along Riverside Park in front of the Boys and Girls Club. The mural features a snake that forms the letters SNM, which Martinez says stand for the name of a prison gang.

He said the piece highlights the challenge of any graffiti work that has public support. Without oversight, it can quickly become a promotion of criminal behavior and incite more such activity. Plus, he says, it's foolish to see such projects as a deterrent to tagging.

"The idea that if we give them a wall they will stop everywhere else, that sounds like extortion to me," the detective said. "They are holding us hostage and saying 'If you give us something, we will stop doing this.' There has to be somewhere in the middle where we can all meet, other than us being held hostage by these people who feel they need to do their art on other people's property."

Contact Julie Ann Grimm at 986-3017 or jgrimm@sfnewmexican.com.