NYC Graffiti Wall at Bowery: New Mural by Raul Ayala
The latest mural at the Bowery Wall is the only new mural for 2020 and was painted by artist Raul Ayala and 10 students from Groundswell NYC.
By Sanah Bukhari
If you are around Lower Manhattan, you cannot miss the eye-catching vivid new NYC graffiti wall at Houston Street between Bowery and Elizabeth streets. The current mural, ‘To Open a Portal,’ was painted by Brooklyn artist Raul Ayala accompanied by 10 young student artists. Goldman Properties and Goldman Global Arts connected with Groundswell to create the epic mural at the Bowery Wall. This NYC graffiti wall installation coincides with the 25th anniversary of Groundswell, an organization that uses art to advocate for social change.
This mural focuses on allegory and community and stays away from volatile topics such as politics. The wall depicts history and aspiration. Ayala’s mural, the latest installation at the historic Bowery wall, has a seafaring folklore theme with mythical creatures pulling down statues. On the left side, the skyline of Manhattan appears. Ayala thinks this is a teachable and inspirational piece and that is exactly what he did during the 21 days that it took to complete this mural - teach.
Ten talented young volunteer artists from the Groundswell NYC community organization partnered with Ayala to paint the various phases of the mural while passerby admired the mural coming to life. The artistic team included Gabriela Balderas, Charlize Beltre, Brandon Bendter, Junior Steven Clavijo, Jennifer Contreras, Maria Belen Flores, Hafsa Habib, Cipta Hussain, Karina Linares and Gabriel Pala.
Ayala described the mural as “opening a portal,” and this is a portal of the mind to imagination and inspiration.
“For me, building imagination and sharing knowledge alongside a younger generation of artists is a great manifestation of the fruits of this shift,” Ayala says. “With this mural, we are also bringing inter-generational participation into a future that honors our past while actively creating a different path of existence.”
Raul Ayala is an Ecuadorian visual artist and educator who focuses on producing murals, drawings, urban art and illustration, and features themes related to freedom, justice, immigration, and urban-rural politics. His work has been shown in many countries worldwide and works in collaboration with art collectives in New York and Quito, Ecuador.
On the right-hand portion of the mural we see Black people and Native Americans. Some are seen congregating, sewing together, weaving a tree together. Two women perform a ritualistic ceremony with the use of incense with flowers blooming above. There is also an elderly man opening a carpet from one end and another girl holding it from the other with a leopard and bird trapped in the middle.
In the mid-portion of the mural we see some folklore style, mythical drawings depicting a rather dark and dreary mood. A mask-wearing creature is pulling down a statue, while two skeleton-like structures hold onto each other and one is sitting on a humongous dead fish with several small fish coming out of its mouth. We see something that looks to be a mammoth skull on the ground with another fish-like creature with two holes of water flushing out like a submarine. Finally, in the far left you see an angelic, naked structure that looks like it’s falling down to earth with the Manhattan skyline behind that.
The layered mural indeed gives the imagination much to play with at the famed graffiti wall. The Bowery graffiti wall has become a New York institution for showcasing incredible artists’ visions from around the world. The Bowery wall was first painted by artist Keith Haring in the 1970s. The wall normally changes every few months, but with coronavirus grinding everything to a halt, this is the first new mural to grace the wall in 2020.
“This partnership with Goldman Global Arts is the perfect way to kick off Groundswell’s 25th Anniversary!” Groundswell Executive Director said in a statement. “At Groundswell, we believe that reflecting on our complicated past and present conditions is necessary to bring about the world we want to see. Raul Ayala’s work in collaboration with our incredible youth ‘artivists’ embodies this liberation philosophy by artistically telling the story of our ongoing fight for social justice and the importance of activism that is rooted in love and creativity.”
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Sanah Bukhari moved to NYC last year and got to experience the city pre-pandemic. Now she finds joy in the smaller things in life, like nature walks and a zen yoga session, as well as writing to escape this unexpected year we are all going through.
