Reykjavik's Thriving Street Art Culture • Mellzah

I was so thrilled by the art everywhere on Reykjavik streets–peeping around corners of buildings, on parking structures, even on temporary wooden boards meant to hide construction. Everywhere I looked, there was more art, and I tried to look everywhere, behind apartment buildings, down side streets, only chickening out at the prospect of climbing a teeny tiny ladder to get on top of a particularly art-covered building. I’m sure I still only saw a small portion. At one point, I was trying to navigate a path to get a closer view of one building and slipped on the ice, falling onto my purse so hard that all the air whoofed out of me. I was certain that I’d managed to break my phone, my camera, and no fewer than three ribs, but luckily, nothing broke. The only damage was a massive Iceland-shaped bruise that bloomed on my side, which turned shockingly purple with even darker tectonic plate lines which lined up with a seam on my pants. In other words, super cute. Also, as a mature adult, every time I felt an ache in that area for the rest of the trip, I would moan “Oooooh, my ass-land”, which never stopped being funny for me because I was overtired for the entire trip, but probably got old for Jason on the second or third repetition. The thing that deeply bummed me out were the instances when an otherwise beautiful mural was tagged with things like “faggot” and “kill your fucking self”, because if you can’t contribute, why not destroy something, right?

There’s so much more art after the cut, including some of my favorites!