I saw mosaics in two places, both close to the same corner – Lexington and East 104th.
The first set can be seen under the windows of what is now Exotic Fragrances Inc. – radiating Be Barrio Love and yo chicken.
below: “This our home land here now” with a cheerful and accepting rainbow “everyone welcome”.
below: Shelves of fancy decorated perfume bottles looking lovely in the window, an interesting accompaniment to the “I got you” mosaic below it.
Around the corner, a whole mural made of little tiles. A picture of an elephant, a snail, and a lot of white doves circling the Earth. A row of brightly coloured tenement buildings anchors the picture. It was commissioned by Hope Community Inc. and was constructed by artist Manny Vega., The mural is titled ‘Al Ritmo de La Paz’ (To the Rhythm of Peace) and it is on East 104th Street, just east of Lexington Avenue,
British mural artist Phlegm has been painting a large mural on the side of 1 St. Clair West. The first time I saw it, was on the 14th of July, 2016, when it looked liked this:
below: The white background of the mural was painted first.
below: Photo from 19th July, 2016
As it turns out, there is a lot of detail in the mural! It slowly took shape.
below: 21st July
below: Fast forward to August 2016 when the mural was almost finished. … but wait! Isn’t that the CN tower on the shoulder?
below: Hey! It is the CN tower. And isn’t that the Gooderham/flatiron building? And that building with the little dome, isn’t that on Yonge street?
below: There’s the ROM and its ‘crystal’ too! This is the ‘bottom’ of the figure and in this photo two things become clearer. First, the scale of the project and just how big the mural is becomes apparent. Second, the mural is of a person coming out of the earth, being pulled out by the roots almost. But is it a person? Or is it a living city?
below: The head part – play ‘spot the building’! Is that old city hall?
below: Scalliwags is on one of the knees along with a lot of trees.
below: And last, the feet with more roots at the heels
below: Michael Jackson, young and old, by Eduardo Kobra in East Village, NYC.
below: Hanging out on a corner with Run-DMC, a HipHop group originally from Queens. The group was formed in 1983 (40 years ago!!) by Joseph Simmons, Darryl McDaniels, and Jason Mizell .There was some controversy over the choice of song for this mural as “Walk the Way” was their cover of an Aerosmith rock ‘n roll hit.
below: Ruth Bader Ginsburg (1933-2020). She served on the US Supreme Court from 1993 until 2020. She was born in Brooklyn NY.
Apparently there are many Kobra murals scattered around New York City. In 2018 he painted 18 of them. So far, I only have a few on this blog. First, Andy Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat beside him, fighting for street art in Williamsburg
Also, in Chelsea, Warhol and Basquiat re-appear, this time accompanied by two more artists, Frida Kahlo and Keith Haring. This mural is on the same post as Ghandi and Mother Theresa, Kobra on 10th Avenue
A large mural in Girona Spain painted by Erica Il Cane (ericailcane) oof a crocdile with wings on its back.
Over the years her scaly skin has lost its greenish blue colour but otherwise she is aging well.
From Wikipedia: “According to legend, she was once a nun who, due to her lack of faith, was punished and imprisoned in the dungeon of the city’s monastery, and could only leave to go to the river that runs through the city (Onyar River). After many years, due to her undernourishment and isolation, she grew scales until she fully metamorphosed into a crocodile-like creature. In spite of this punishment, she was still somewhat saintly, which manifested as a pair of butterfly wings.
Breaking Walls was an Urban Arts and Culture event in Montreal that was held back in June of this year. It was supported by Kolors Worldwide (“Let’s kolor the world”) and MOS Canada – Meeting of Styles Canada. The event was held in a space between rue Moreau and the railway tracks, close to rue Rouen, in the Hochelaga-Maisonneuve neighbourhood. In hindsight, I realize that I missed a couple of the murals the day that I was there. Additionally, a couple of the smaller pieces that I have included may be graffiti that pre-dates the Breaking Walls event.
below: I am going to call it a blue traffic circle because it’s blue and it has traffic related items in it such as an orange cone, the front of a car, street signs, and traffic lights yellow. It was painted by Sergio MB. Unfortunately, the red and white tag has already defaced the work.
To the left of this purple dog (by Hank) was a painting of a woman’s portrait in turquoise that unfortunately has already been tagged over. It was painted by Polographe and can be seen on his Instagram page.
below: Arlick Enigma ( Arlick PaXman Team), originally from Mexico, painted this wonderful portrait of a child wearing a parka with a fur lined hood.
Murals in the central part of the city. Some old and some new.
below: Conor Harrington headless duellng men, or one man against himself?
below: It looks like a small blue whale inside a larger transparent whale. It’s called “Detecting Machine” and it was painted by Nevercrew, a pair of artists, Pablo Togni and Christian Rebecchi.
below: Be stronger than your excuses, under the bridge
below: Be yourself, everyone else is already taken
below: ‘The Giant Storybook Project’ by Herakut, painted Oct. 2012, on St. Paul Street
All pictures taken May 2023 except the bottom photo which is from 2015. The mural is still there but I didn’t take another picture of it when I was in Rochester a couple of months ago.
There are a series of 5 paintings by Bone Head nestled between the windows of a building that backs onto Graffiti Alley in Toronto. As the name suggests, Bone Head painted characters with large boney heads or skulls. They also have a penchant for white shirts and striped neck ties!
On a little dead end street near Gumpendorfgasse u-bahn station, there is a small series of murals. The most prominent one, is of a man in a black striped long sleeved T-shirt taking a picture with a polaroid camera.
To his right are a few images that look like they are the resulting polaroids – part of his collection perhaps.
These images were painted by Jana and JS, a couple who have been painting murals together for many years.
Because COVID is still slowing everyone down, I continue to search through old travel pictures because I know that there are still lots of photos of street art that I haven’t shared. Today I found four murals by mr.besk that I saw the last time that I was in Instanbul. They feature yellow outlines and little Basquiat-type three pointed crowns.
Traditional clothing and a pearl necklace with a very untraditional maskAlbert Einsten making faces on Turkgucu
Eyes on the Streets 