Image via Complex Original
Believe it or not, half of 2015 is already in the bag. Despite the harsh winter and overall slow pace of the early months, a lot of great street art was created around the world by veteran artists, as well as some emerging talent. Before we get bombarded with dozens of murals a week this summer, let’s take a look at the most badass and impressive pieces that the streets had to offer.
Tristan Eaton x How & Nosm
Location: Brooklyn
While visiting the city he once called home, Tristan Eaton spent many hours painting several murals in Brooklyn and Manhattan. This collaboration with twins How & Nosm replaced an older collab between the three artists that was a landmark piece for the neighborhood, and this new mural is already a hit. The level of detail is insane, and we wouldn’t believe how fast they finished this piece if we hadn’t watched the process in person.
Tristan Eaton x Cyrcle
Location: Brooklyn
Another mural from Tristan Eaton’s NYC visit (on the same building as the How & Nosm collab) is this collaboration with Los Angeles-based collective CYRCLE. The mural is the first of many for CYRCLE in New York City and it’s a dope blend of their unique style with Eaton’s. Not everyone could paint such a cohesive piece on such a disjointed wall—windows separate the panels and there’s a rolldown.
El Mac
Location: Boston
The latest addition to Northeastern University’s Public Art Initiative, this mural features a beautiful woman holding a paintbrush and a lighting bolt in El Mac’s signature style of shading and overlapping circular patterns. The wall is four-stories tall and El Mac continued painting parts of it after the sun went down, shining a spotlight on the wall when many others would have packed it in for the evening.
Nosego x Woes for Pow!Wow!
Location: Honolulu
Woes and Nosego painted the bulk of this mural, but other artists including Lauren YS, Caratoes, Sainer, and Boykong contributed elements to the final piece. It’s the perfect example of the collaborative spirit of POW!WOW!, and the colorful imagery is incredible. Having six chefs in the kitchen never works this well.
Axel Void
Location: Italy
This portrait of a broken baby Jesus figure was painted on a former church in the town of Mosciano. As Axel Void explains to Streetartnews, he painted the figure split in half because he is “negating its spiritual nature and therefore treating it as an object that means nothing without human’s interpretation.” The textures on the figure would be difficult for anyone else to capture on canvas, let alone a wall on the top of a building.
Banksy
Location: Gaza
Already the most talked about street art of the year (because Banksy), these three pieces painted in Gaza City are actually worth the hype. The fact that he was able to get in and out of the city, and the fact that the murals address the current state of the war-torn region are reasons to respect the elusive and often polarizing street artist.
Ron English on the Bowery Wall
Location: New York City
Another great addition to the history of the infamous Bowery Mural Wall. English and his team pasted the Hulk Baby on the landmark and surrounded him with an American flag comprised of satirical ads that criticize consumer culture. Legendary photographer Martha Cooper stopped by to document the installation, and other icons including Cope2 were also there to show love for English as he tackled the important canvas with his assistants. The mural is impressive from far away, and it gets crazier when you see just how many smaller pieces English had to create to build the larger image.
Pixel Pancho x Evoca1
Location: East London, UK
Not much to say about this mural…it’s just sick. The combination of Pixel Pancho’s robotic figures with Evoca1’s roosters is perfect, and it makes the imagery of a dead bird oddly attractive. The wall isn’t as massive as some others on this list, but the high traffic location surely made their job of painting two of the most intricate textures (metal and feathers) that much harder.
Natalia Rak for Pow!Wow!
Location: Honolulu
The colors, the detail in the Bengal tiger’s face, the intensity in the woman’s eyes...everything about this mural is amazing. The scale is crazy, especially for one person. The fellas are putting in good work, but the female artists are killing it in 2015.
Case Ma’Claim x Smithe for Pow!Wow!
Location: Honolulu
Both masters of color and detail, this collaboration between Smithe and Case Ma’Claim belongs in a museum where it can be preserved forever. When you’re up on a lift, you don’t really have the luxury of stepping back every five minutes to make sure everything looks good, and you can’t really fake perfection when it comes to hands and other anatomy. Both artists have had large pieces tagged in New York City, but hopefully the public is more respectful of this masterpiece down in Hawaii.
Seth Globepainter x HTJ in Tahiti
Location: Tahiti
The Ono'u Tahiti Street Art Festival was a game changer and really put Tahiti on the map as far as the culture is concerned. Working with local artist HTJ, Seth Globepainter painted a girl sleeping on fabric with a bright Polynesian print. The art is cool, but what makes this piece so badass is that it pays homage to the history of the Polynesian people of Tahiti, who now get to see it everyday.
Lauren YS x Tati Suarez x Caratoes
Location: San Francisco
This is a trifecta of emerging female artists who are killing it in these streets. Painted in San Francisco for Jansport’s Live Outside 2015 Project, the piece is titled “Rock, Paper, Scissors” and exists on a wall right in the middle of the city. Whoever said that size doesn’t matter is a liar and obviously not a street art fan.
Askew x Elliot Francis Stewart
Location: Port Adelaide, Australia
The two artists painted this wall as homage to the history of the Port, including text that translates to: “Let’s recognize Kaurna People and Kaurna Land. It’s good that you came to Kaurna land. Learn from the past so that we can grasp the future.” Various other elements included in the mural symbolize important facets of the region’s culture and history, all of which are explained in the artists’ statement. To get it done, they also had two lifts working at the same time, which is not something you see everyday.
Nychos
Location: Vienna
Dissection of a Polar Bear was Nychos’ first large-scale piece in his hometown, and we’re sure the people of Vienna think that it was worth the wait. No one paints anatomy quite like Nychos, though some have tried and failed. The wall is nearly 80 feet tall, so you can imagine how many cans of paint it took to cover it.
Esao Andrews x Aaron Horkey for Pow!Wow!
Location: Honolulu
Aaron Horkey is known mostly for his illustrations and graphic design work, but we have no objections to him dipping back into using aerosols. The level of detail that he and Esao were able to squeeze into this mural is unreal, and it’s worth the cost of a one-way ticket to Hawaii just to see it in person. Believe it or not, Esao only had one mural under his belt before tackling this wall, and Horkey had not used spray paint for nearly 15 years before the collaboration.
GILF! at 190 Bowery
Location: New York City
We encouraged you to pay attention to GILF!’s art not long after she wrapped 5 Pointz with a “Gentrification in Progress” banner. The New York-based artist headed downtown recently to continue the series at the “Graffiti Mansion” at 190 Bowery, which will soon be converted into condos and storefronts. That corner is always busy, so we’re not sure how she wasn’t caught. We could ask, but that would take away from the magic of the important art.