Murals: DC Edition #4

This was the weekend of festivals, but I actually only managed to make it to one. The first festival I wanted to go to was the Caribbean festival, which I've wanted to go to the past couple of years, but didn't make it. So the plan was to go to the parade at 11 a.m. on Saturday morning, and not pay to actually get into the festival, which shouldn't be that difficult. But unfortunately, despite getting up at 8 a.m., we made it to the parade route just after it finished. All was not lost though, as I did discover a mural that I had been meaning to make a trip out to see for a while now. It is titled "Daughter of Oshun in the New World", by Joel Bergner and is part of the Georgia Avenue Global Mural Project, funded by a grant from the DC Commission on the Arts & Humanities, which promote murals all around the city. It is located near Georgia Avenue NW and Kenyon Street NW.

Murals: DC Edition #3

So I pass by this mural all the time, but never really looked at it until a couple of weeks ago, and it made me laugh, because when I think Burger King, of course I think Oasis in the City. This is on K Street, which is the main corridor of the downtown business district.

An Oasis in the City

Murals: DC Edition #2

I thought I might as well continue the theme of murals. These are once again, all from Adams Morgan.

While blog-hopping, I learned that this mural was painted over. It's a shame, I really liked that one.


I'm not a huge fan of this one, but it's large and very close to my old apartment, so I passed it all the time.

One of Many Back Burner Projects

So I've lived in DC for two years now. For a large portion of that time I have had a project in mind, but it just never seems to get done, and instead grows in size. It all started because I lived in Adams Morgan. Every day I would walk by the Marilyn Monroe mural on my way to the metro and I loved it. Two others soon joined the list - the Madam's Organ mural and the Sombrero Man on 18th street. The first variation of my project was merely to take a nice picture of each and blow them up and hang them on the wall. For various reasons, I somehow managed to never fully accomplish this, be it I never had my camera with me, it was winter and crappy looking, and so on. I finally have 3 pictures that I like, but they still aren't printed and framed.

The project continued to grow, despite my lack of work on it. I next decided I wanted to do a coffee table book of DC murals. I do have a slowly growing collection of mural photos, and every now and then I do a burst of research and add to my list of murals, but it's very far from completion. By the time I move away, maybe it will be done.

My favorite picture of 18th Street.

Madam's Organ


Sombrero Man


Marilyn Monroe




The closest I've come to achieving the first step of my project - a photo collage of Marilyn at night.


This print was my Christmas present last year - I love this artist, Joseph Harrison Snyder , who does these amazing watercolors of DC scenery. This one is of 18th Street, so I guess I have to get a Logan Circle one now.

Murals Near and Far - San Francisco Version

So murals are one of my favorite photo subjects, so of course I take the opportunity everywhere I go to take pictures of them.

Austin Murals

So I have a project now, involving murals of DC. I'm going to wait a bit before I divulge what it actually is, but I am not going to post any of my DC mural pictures because of it. Instead, I will go back into the archives and pull out some Austin mural pictures.

Most of these are on or near the Drag by campus, including this one.

The frog/alien is quite a local fixture...when the building was bought recently, it was a stipulation of the sale that he not be painted over. The artist is Daniel Johnson, who is a fascinating character.

This mural (the next 2 pictures) has so many little Austin insider tidbits. The naked guy running with the bongos on the right of the top picture is Matthew McConaughey.
This mural is on the side of the Gingerbread Man downtown, and I think it's my favorite.