“people” I encountered in Montreal….

Random sightings around Montreal

below: A portrait on pink accompanied by a gorgeous bird and a few flowers in a mural by Melissa Falconer

A portrait of a black woman on pink painted brick accompanied by a gorgeous bird and a few flowers in a mural by Melissa Falconer, on side of Baguette & Brochette shop

below: The remains of a mural by Phlegm

part of a mural by phlegm, black and white

below: Framed and topless Fractal Juice

graffiti, fractal juice, framed picture of person with colours shifted so that it looks like it is in multiple copies.  Person has black hair and many red and yellow flowers in hair, topless, with white fabric draped over one shoulder

below: No faces here, instead two bodies merged into one, “Liberté” by Franco Fasoli (aka Jaz), 2015.

 two bodies merged into one at the shoulders, no heads or necks, two silhouettes of bulls behind them, called Liberte, mural painted by Jaz, a k a Franco Fasoli.  Arms and legs have tattoos, both wearing blue shorts

below: A face in purple and blue, by Philippe Mastrocola and Melsa Montagne

mural, large face in shades of pink, blue, and purple, by Melsa Montagne and Philippe Mastrocola

below: Part of a larger mural originally painted by Scaner in 2014. It was fixed up in 2018 by Zek One and Axe Lalime.

Part of a larger mural originally painted by Scaner in 2014, skull showing, a skeleton with clothes, upright and walking.  Wearing blue jacket, white shirt, and red tie, also wearing a hat

below: Call me Daniel

very red background, street art is black line drawing of a person with no hair on top of head but long hair doen the back, open mouth screaming, with text call me Daniel

below: The top part of “Ne m’oublie pas” (“Don’t Forget Me”), created by artist Kezna Dalz during the 2024 Mural Festival

very white man with red lips and  eyes closed looking upward, a halo over his head, wings on his back, in a mural by Kezna Dalz

below: Bottom of the same mural

bottom part of n'oublie pas mural by Kezna Dalz, two people

below: Incomplete and unfinished, Damaged, one-eyed man who doesn’t look too pleased – perhaps it’s the squiggles that have taken over his forehead.

black and white and grey shades, realistic image of an older man with a mustache  but one eye and top of head is missing

below: Osheen Siva painted this large portrait with its radiating long blue hair and blue lips.

portrait by Osheen Siva, mural in Montreal, brown person with long blue hair, green lines on neck and shoulder, blue lips,

below: SNIKR’s paint roller girls

building with two murals, on upper floor is a woman with a paint roller, by SNIKR, lower floor has portrait of the young woman with a paint roller as well

below: Mural on the lower level seen closer.

building with two murals bySNIKR, mural on the lower level seen closer.  young woman with large collar on her jacket, paint roller over her shoulder

below: I think that the signature says Lea but I am not sure. What I am sure of is that he/she has a strange imagination!

two halves, divided horizontally, upper half is painting by Lea, purple sky, man with small hat, smiley face on front of his shirt, smile on his face, but with hands that look like snake heads

below: “C’est compliqué” (It’s Complicated) by Sara Erenthal. Unfortunately the bottom part of the mural has been painted over. Originally there were two figures within the body of the woman (see next photo)…..

part of mural by Sara Erenthal, woman with surprised expression on her face, black line drawing but with red mouth
bottom part of mural, two figures sanding together

below: All wrapped up.

painting on a wood fence, probably male character with head wrapped in white bandages, blue shorts up to chin, big mouth,

below: Take the iconic I ♥ NY and transform it into a love letter to Montreal.

I love anything to do with Montreal graffiti

below: Tasty treats and curly straws.

man sitting on bench beside a food shop, with mural on outside wall, line drawing of people with drinks with curly straws, and one dog,

below: You’ve seen the signs that say “Beware of Dog”, well, here we have Beware of Old Bald Man!

doorway covered with graffiti including a bald wrestler on the door wearing bootss

below: She has six hands, two of which are holding a skull. She also has a very long (and ugly) tongue. Not the kind of person (creature?) that you would want to run into in an alley – even if she does have some similarities to the Hindu goddess Kali. Kali is associated with time, destruction, death, and the Divine Motherhood; she is the power of creation and destruction. I guess that she needs six hands after all. Painted by Bibi Una.

painting, Kali Bibi,

below: Obscured by fragments of those left behind.

eyes, from an older piece of street art where the lower parts of the face have been papered over with other graffiti, now torn

below: Sad button eyes

graffiti in Montreal on a red brick wall including a sad character that looks ike a stuffie with stitched mouth and tummy, sad face mouth, one eye is an X and the other eye looks like a button that has been sewn on

below: Happy faces

scrawl graffiti in blue and red including a couple of happy faces on corrugated metal fence

below: Rage5 stencilled on five heads covered

5 stencils in a row, woman in black head scarf,  necks covered too,  with rage5 on each head, graffiti in Montreal

below: mmm

graffiti of man farting. body looks lke Homer Simpson but head is different

below: It vaguely looks like a person….

drawing in black with red scribbled over it,  that looks vaguely like a person, graffiti

below: A tiny man under a red heart

two pieces of graffiti on a wall, one is a tiny man and the other is a red heart

below: “I’m feeling blue – may be the skeleton is too, he’s been scrolling so long on his phone he doesn’t realize that he’s now dead.

slaps on the back of a sign, a blue square with text that says I am blue.

below: A big toothy grin and a sticker from peau-bleus

stickers on the back of a sign

below: FUQU and a wrench (probably profane but c’est la vie), wings and devil horns.

sticker graffiti, character with fuqu on front

below: “I’m grateful you’re alive” … I am also grateful that you have found your way to this page!

sticker graffiti, white with words written on it, I am grateful you are alive

Photos taken September 2024

Tor Marancia

On Viale Tor Marancia in Rome there is another residential area that has had murals painted on the four storey apartment buildings. There are 21 or 22 of them in total. Many of the murals are now at least ten years old so some of the colours have faded. Like most projects involving residential areas and mural, there is an organization behind them. In this case it is ‘Big City Life’ which is turn is a product of 999Contemporary. There was also collaboration with ATER – Azienda Territoriale per l’Edilizia Residenziale and Comune di Roma

below: An eye along with a partial face was carved into the wall on this building back in 2015. This is a method that Portuguese artist Vhils (aka Alexandre Farto) has used to create images.

large mural on the side of a four storey apartment building in Tor Marancia, Rome, white face carved into the building, by Vhils

below: This is “Bambino Redentore” (which translates to “Redeemer Child”). painted by French street artist Seth in 2015.

large mural on the side of a four storey apartment building in Tor Marancia, Rome, back of a boy climbing a colored ladder, painted by Seth

below: A look at part of the public housing development on Tor Marancia. The buildings date from the 1960s. They replaced earlier housing that was provided for the people who had been displaced from areas near the Vatican decades earlier.

pathway between apartment buildings

below: Clemens Behr’s abstract figure.

large mural on the side of a four storey apartment building in Tor Marancia, Rome, abstract figure by Clemens Behr

below: A collection of many squares of different colours, by Italian street artist Alberonero (aka Luca Boffi). In fact, it’s title, “A Carlo Alberto 93 Colori” (“To Carlo Alberto 93 Colours”) suggests that there are 93 squares.

large mural on the side of a four storey apartment building in Tor Marancia, Rome, 93 colored squares by albernonero

below: “Alme Sol Invictus” by Domenico Romeo; the title references the ancient Roman god of the sun, Sol Invictus.

large mural on the side of a four storey apartment building in Tor Marancia, Rome, red on white calligraphy type mural, circle shape, sun-like

below: Natura Morta by Reka (aka James Reka) – people, curly hair, fruit, flowers, a wine glass.

large mural on the side of a four storey apartment building in Tor Marancia, Rome,

below: Just peeking out is one of the faces in “Nostra Signora di Shanghai” by Mr Klevra. The whole mural shows a mother holding a child, a religious image that is seen over and over again in Rome (and in all of Italy). One could also say that it is Rome (the mother) holding Tor Marancia (the child). The title translates to “Our Lady of Shanghai” as once upon a time this neighbourhood had the nickname of Shanghai.

large mural on the side of a four storey apartment building in Tor Marancia, Rome, large mural face peeking out from behind another building

below: Argentinian artist Jaz’s (aka Franco Fasoli) work, “Il Peso della Storia” (The Weight of History) depicts two wrestlers in the middle of a fight. One wrestler is carrying another on his back, representing the weight of Tor Marancia’s history. It was the first Big City Life mural (2014).

large mural on the side of a four storey apartment building in Tor Marancia, Rome, two wrestlers in a fight, painted by Jaz in 2014

below: Another mural from 2015, is “Hic Sunt Adamantes”, by local street artist Diamond. Ancient Romans used to write on maps “Hic Sunt Leones” (“Here Be Dragons”) to describe the areas that had not yet been explored. Diamond turned the popular sentence into Here Be Diamonds to highlight the great potential of the area. In this mural, Diamond painted in his iconic, Art Nouveau style a representation of Rome: a sleeping beauty unable to wake up from her numbness. And there is also a Shanghai reference: a Chinese dragon inside a golden garland that sparkles in the sunshine.

large mural on the side of a four storey apartment building in Tor Marancia, Rome, sleeping woman in art deco style decoration, by diamond,

below:

below: German street artist SatOne (aka Rafael Gerlach). “Talking Like a Waterfall” (2015) .

large mural on the side of a four storey apartment building in Tor Marancia, Rome, abstract design by Rafael Gerlach

below: Lek (aks Frédéric Malek) and Sowat ( Mathieu Kendrick) working together since 2010. painted “Veni, Vidi, Vinci.” This is not a typo, but an intended twist of Giulio Cesare’s famous sentence to tribute another notable Italian: Leonardo da Vinci.

two large murals on the sides of a four storey apartment building in Tor Marancia, Rome, one is a large hand and the other is three words, veni, vidi, Vinci

below: An orange, part of a building, and a head? Does that head have a body? This is “Spettacolo, Rinnovamento, Maturità” (translation: “Performance, Renewal, Maturity,” 2015) by Gaia (aka Andrew Pisacane). Perhaps the orange makes more sense in Italian where it becomes ‘anancia’ and here we are in Tor M’arancia’. (more of Gaia’s work can be seen in a blog post from Heerlen Netherlands, Four for Community)

large mural on the side of a four storey apartment building in Tor Marancia, Rome, by gaia

below: She may be involved in an intimate encounter but she seems more interested in what’s happening elsewhere. This is “the Pyramid”, a hug, by English twosome Best Ever (aka Neil Edward and Hadley Newman)

large mural on the side of a four storey apartment building in Tor Marancia, Rome, a man and a woman are hugging, man's face can't be seen, woman is looking out over the street

below: The now familiar face of Greta Thunberg.

below: “The Hand of God” by Jerico (aka Jerico Cabrera Carandang) obviously inspired by Michelangelo’s “The Creation of Adam” in the Sistine Chapel. ceiling frescoes) except here the fingers are surrounded by cherry blossoms

large mural on the side of a four storey apartment building in Tor Marancia, Rome, two large hands with index fingers pointing to each other, plus some white blossoms

below: Bluish grey snake-like fish (whales?) school together, in “Il Ponentino” by Pantonio

large mural on the side of a four storey apartment building in Tor Marancia, Rome, a school of bluish grey fish swimming

below: And lastly, not a mural but a delight to find – a small collection of colourful flowers and a little white hummingbird was stenciled onto one of the walls, by STEW.

stencil of white hummingbird over colourful flowers, by stew

Photos taken February 2024

Kadikoy murals

‘Muralist Istanbul’ is an annual mural painting festival that has been running in the Kadikoy area of Istanbul since 2012.    Most of the murals on this page are from 2013 so you know that this is only a sample of what can be seen in Kadikoy!

 

below: The bottom part of “Occupy Antarctica”.  What is missing is a clock and a red fez – both are above the penguins.  Painted by B. Shanti.

a small blue car is parked in front of the bottom part of a large mural in Kadikoy Istanbul, a group of penguins on top and some text street art on the bottom

below: Two purplish horsemen separated by a column of windows,  by Franco Fasoli aka Jaz (from Argentina) called “One against One” painted in 2013.

large purple hued mural in Kadikoy, two horsemen facing each other with a column of windows in the middle, by Argentinian artis Jaz

 

below: The text says Captain Borderline.  The title is “Sufi of Kadikoy/Totem” and it is the work of Dabtar from Germany.  Dabtar is a member of the Captain Borderline Crew (as is fellow German, B. Shanti, above).

large mural in Kadikoy Istanbul, a man, clownish features, black bears, standing up,

 

below: “Resistencia” by Inti. Skulls on the wrists and an apple in hand.

large mural by inti in Kadikoy Turkey, person with hood, holding an apple in hand,

below: A closer look at the bottom part of the mural that is in the shade.   An ace up the sleeve.

details of inti mural, hand with tattoos

below: Eyes on the balloon, watching as it rises over the vacant lot. “Balao ” by Brazilian artist Claudio Ethos, 2013.

large mural in Kadikoy on the side of a building, hot air balloon, on the side of a building, vacant lot beside behind hoardings covered with ad posters Painted by Brazilian artist Claude Ethos

below: “In Dreams” by Freddy Sam (aka Ricky Lee Gordon)  An elephant at night, under the moon and stars.  Most of his murals are in shades of grey.

a large mural of a realistic looking elephant at night, in grey tones, moon and stars too

below: I couldn’t find any information on this mural.

large mural in Kadikoy of an abstracted face in yellow, blue, red, and green, eyes looking out onto the street

If you plan to visit Kadikoy, do a bit of research online first and save yourself some time! Images and the locations of most of the murals are on the internet.