MURAL ARTISTS - GIANT STAIRWELL GRAFFITI

mural artists,graffiti,street art
mural artists,graffiti,street art

MURAL ARTISTS
MIKE PARSONS

Mural Artists -Massive Graffiti Stairwell Mural! Giant Tombstone Towers hover over endless crowds of tiny faceless denizens. Tilting and spinning the city inspires a playful vertigo inciting both caution and adventure as we lose our self amidst the madness. All of my drawings take place within an imaginary “City of Gears”. In this allegorical metropolis the buildings resemble giant gears while it is up to all the different people moving through them to fuel the machine. While each of my artwork deals with different themes the primary message behind my “HEY APATHY” project is that everything we do makes a difference both as individuals and as a collective society.

For this monumental mural project I decided to revisit some of my earliest and most iconic imagery from the HEY APATHY! 2001 collection. These city-scape were perfect for the 4 story stairwell for several reasons. Conceptually we (the owners of the building and myself) wanted to create something that would be visually striking and have a real urban feel to it but not as stressful or chaotic as my street artworks because people would be working in the building every day. The exposed stairwell is also highly visible from the passing highway so we needed a design that would work both from inside and from a distance to give the building a distinguished characteristic. I decided to use these images to emulate ancient cave drawings in a way that fit perfectly with both our conceptual and technical concerns.

I painted the mural using white acrylic enamel paints on a tinted black surface using a 1.5 inch thick paint brush and a 4 inch roller on an extendable pole. From top to bottom the stairwell is comprised of a 5 floors including the basement and rooftop with 4 landings located between each floor. The (physically exhausting) installation took approximately 15 hours to complete. I finished the basic design layout in 10 hours and was able to add a second coat & clean up the edges in an additional 5 hours. It took me almost 2 days to recover from swollen hands and stiff muscles but it was worth it. I am really happy with this as it is by far the largest and I believe the most visually striking mural work I have completed so far.  

mural artists,graffiti,street art

STAIRWELL # 1  CROWDS

mural artists,graffiti,street art
mural artists,graffiti,street art
mural artists,graffiti,street art
mural artists,graffiti,street art

STAIRWELL # 2 TRAFFIC

mural artists,graffiti,street art
mural artists,graffiti,street art
mural artists,graffiti,street art
mural artists,graffiti,street art

This is the main entrance to the building and features a traffic scene made up of cartoon cars & buildings

STAIRWELL #3 PEOPLE

mural artists,graffiti,street art
mural artists,graffiti,street art
mural artists,graffiti,street art
mural artists,graffiti,street art

Similar to the crowd scene this stairwell depicts people only this time they are shown separated as individuals as opposed to the massive hordes.

  

STAIRWELL #4 BRICKS

mural artists,graffiti,street art
mural artists,graffiti,street art
mural artists,graffiti,street art
mural artists,graffiti,street art

The last stairwell features an exposed brick pattern emphasizing the giant tombstone towers themselves. Like the crowds, individuals and traffic, the architecture is a major entity in the mechanics of being admist the city of gears...

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RETURN TO HEY APATHY  COMICS & ART HOMEPAGE