GORGEOUS URBAN ARTIVISM GRAFFITI: MONA CARON

MONA CARON

Cities, like all places, have both good and bad, benefits and deficits, beauty and ugliness to offer both residents and visitors. In some cases, there is more to be found in cities, given higher concentrations of people and resources. In other cases, cities are in short supply. And there is an opportunity to bridge the gaps -- to take the ugly, the unfair, the threatened, and turn them into the beautiful, powerful, and meaningful.

Mona Caron is a Swiss-born, San Francisco-based artist who creates large scale murals, installed on the facades of urban buildings to bring awareness to issues related to climate justice, labor rights, and water rights. Her focus is on community-informed and site-specific murals in public space.  

Caron’s murals can be found in cities in the US, Europe, South America and Asia. The artist features plants, both native and invasive, that she finds in the cities where she paints.

 

“WEEDS,” Caron’s long running series, feature weeds and flowers painted on buildings to tell stories about resilience and to offer hope for a more beautiful future. Humble weeds -- normally ripped out and discarded, if not ignored -- become symbolic underdog heroes.

The WEEDS project is a metaphor about resilience. It especially speaks to each community in which each mural is located, since the murals are all ultra-site-specific.

Caron’s goal is to activate public space by simultaneously creating artwork and interactive street happenings, using the painting’s narratives to spark conversations and critical awareness of the space we share.

Many of Caron’s murals contain tiny intricate details that are not visible from afar in the street, but rather only seen up close. These typically help to narrate local history, chronicle local social life, and inspire a more beautiful future.

Caron regularly shares process videos and photos of completed works on Instagram, and she delves into the narratives behind several of her murals on her website.

Caron’s process has been featured in an Emmy-winning documentary film, "A Brush With the Tenderloin."

Caron also creates art for street actions and graphics in accompaniment of social and environmental justice movements, local and international, in an effort she calls “Artivism.”

She often collaborates with longtime friend and comrade-in-art, the organizer, artivist and puppetista David Solnit to amplify the visual impact of rallies, while adding the experience of art making and the language of theater to the actions and struggles.

Her art has been used in climate justice movements, water rights, and labor rights groups with organizations including 350.org, the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, Zero-waste Detroit, US Social Forum, La Coordinadora por el Agua y la Vida and Fundación Abril of Cochabamba Bolivia, Acción Ecologica(Ecuador), Land is Life, among others.

Caron also has collaborated with urban commons and bicycle advocacy groups on 3 continents, including several World Bicycle Forums. A few examples of her art for street actions can be seen in this website under Artivism, as well as in in the Studio archive under keywords such as Climate Justice and more.

Caron has also illustrated books, posters for music or political events, news editorials, and more, using various styles of watercolor, block print techniques and more.

Caron’s book illustrations have included collaborations with author Rebecca Solnit, and a children's book based on an Afghani Sufi tale that has been translated into Spanish, Dari and Pashto. She has also created a number of posters for music and cultural events in her home town of San Francisco, some music album art, and editorial illustration. See more of Caron's illustration work in the Studio.

Currently, Caron is circling back towards including narrative elements into her botanical poetic metaphors, within surreal emotive/oniric visions, as can be seen in recent works such as "Outgrowing" in Taiwan or her collaborations "Emergentes" and "Mujeres Custodias".

Read more about Urban Beauty in Random & Planned Beautiful Spots in Paris, Way Beyond Pretty City Suites, Pretty City Ditties, Anime Colored Italian Cities: Davide Sasso, Most Beautiful Nature & Science Museums and Most Beautiful City Picnic Spots.

And check out more beautiful things happening now in BN Mind/Body, Soul/Impact, Nature/Science, Food/Drink, Arts/Design, and Place/Time, Daily Fix posts.

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IMAGE CREDITS:

1. Image: “Outgrowing.” Mural by Mona Caron. Kaohsiung, Taiwan. Courtesy of Mona Caron.
2. Image: “Dandelion,” “Weeds” series at Masjid Darussalam.” Mural by Mona Caron. San Francisco, CA. Courtesy of Mona Caron.
3. Image: “Fireweed.” “Weed” series. Mural by Mona Caron. Portland, OR. Courtesy of Mona Caron.
4. Image: “The Botanical Mural.” Mural by Mona Caron. San Francisco, CA. Courtesy of Mona Caron.
5. Image: Detail of “Emer (Gentes).” Mural by Mona Caron. Vigo, Spain. Courtesy of Mona Caron and Liqen.
6. Image: “Emer (Gentes).” Mural by Mona Caron. Vigo, Spain. Courtesy of Mona Caron and Liqen.
7. Image: Painting “El Camino Real.” Mural by Mona Caron. Hillsdale, California. Courtesy of Mona Caron.
8. Image: “The Botanical Mural.” Mural by Mona Caron. San Francisco, CA. Courtesy of Mona Caron.
9. Image: “A Weed in São Paulo.” “Weed” series. São Paulo, Brazil. Courtesy of Mona Caron.
10. Image: “A Weed in São Paulo.” “Weed” series. São Paulo, Brazil. Courtesy of Mona Caron.
11. Image: “The Botanical Mural.” Mural by Mona Caron. San Francisco, CA. Courtesy of Mona Caron.
12. Image: Mona Caron creating “Bike Flower in Curitiba.” Mural by Mona Caron. Curitiba, Brazil. Courtesy of Mona Caron.
13. Image: “Plantago Lanceolata,” Weeds” series. Mural by Mona Caron. San Francisco, CA. Courtesy of Mona Caron.
14. Image: “El Camino Real.” Mural by Mona Caron. Hillsdale, California. Courtesy of Mona Caron.
15. Image: “Bike Flower in Curitiba.” Mural by Mona Caron. Curitiba, Brazil. Courtesy of Mona Caron.
16. Image:  Mural by Mona Caron. Courtesy of Mona Caron.