Miami's Wynwood Walls New Addition to Hip City

It's always great catching up with Albert!; his enthusiasm, positive energy and infectious laugh just make everything better

Every second Saturday thousands of visitors looking for culture, food and fun crowd the streets of Wynwood to enjoy the best of Miami's art scene during Art Walk

The Wynwood Walls were created in 2009 by the late Tony Goldman in an effort to develop the area's pedestrian potential; Curbed listed Wynwood Walls as among the 16 most Instagrammable places in US cities in 2018

The Wynwood Art District in Miami is one of the largest open-air street art installations in the world; it's also home to more than 10 art galleries

Shepard Fairey, USA; he became widely known during the 2008 U.S. presidential election for his Barack Obama Hope poster

Martin Whatson, Norway; best known for his calligraphic scribbles in grayscale voids, Whatson's work was one of my favorites

Ken Hiratsuka, Japan; like the peaceful rock gardens I saw in Japan, Hiratsuka's sculpted work transcends the differences of nations and languages

Bordalo II, Portugal; famous for his Trash Animals, his creations are made from refuse and in this way he relates us to sustainability, ecology and social awareness

Risk, Rolling Stone Hello Kitty, $30,000; this artist worked on movie and music video sets including the film Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure and videos for the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Ice Cube, Bad Religion and Michael Jackson

The London Police, Taking Bigger Liberties, $22,000; the two guys that make up the London Police began their collaboration in 1998

Kobra, Brazil; in 2016 Kobra painted the then largest mural titled Ethnic Groups which celebrated the 2016 Olympic games and has painted more than 3,000 murals on five different continents

Ron English, Big Red Temper Tot, $90,000; the artist is well-known for creating the obese fast-food mascot featured in the movie Super Size Me

Wynwood reminded me of the Melrose district in LA with it's trendy clothing stores, expensive condos and thriving art scene; the man who redeveloped the Wynwood area had previously done the same for Soho in New York City

Risk, Politely Go Fuck Yourself, $50,000; Risk (aka Kelly Graval) pioneered graffiti on freeway overpasses in Southern California and parlayed his fame into a line of graffiti-inspired clothing

Faile, Listening to the WIld Side, $38,000; Faile is two Brooklyn-based artists who met as kids in Arizona who have become very successful, pop-culture collage masters

Peter Tunney, USA; Liberty, on the left, is selling for $150,000 while Courage, on the right, is a steal at only $60,000

Tomokazu Matsuyama, Japan; born in Takayama, Japan (city I really liked), Matsuyama moved to Brooklyn after college where he attended the Pratt Institute (like many others exhibited here)

Maya Hayuk, Wynwood Wall Redux, $50,000; another Brooklyn-based artist, she famously sued Starbucks but the court decided that shapes, lines and colors were not exclusive to Hayuk and withstood copyright infringement's substantial similarities

Dasic Fernandez, Chile; now living in NYC, he helped paint a rooftop mural to protest Arizona’s controversial anti-immigration law dominated by giant yellow block letters that spell out the statement - no human being is illegal

Ernest Zacharevic, Lithuania; he received worldwide recognition in 2012 after creating a series of six street art murals for the George Town Festival in Penang, Malaysia, with the BBC calling him Malaysia's answer to Banksy

Michael Vasquez, USA; originally from St. Petersburg, FL, the artist moved to Miami where he became known for his vivid paintings that represent the histories, streetwise social codes and mythic nature of a neighborhood street gang

Audrey Kawasaki, USA; her style has been described as a fusion of Art Nouveau and Japanese manga, with primary influences like Gustav Klimt and Alphonse Mucha

Kelsey Montague, USA; Montague's work became famous when Taylor Swift posed in front of her angel wing mural in New York City

Ashop Crew, Canada; this group of artists seems more commercial than the others here with their work being primarily public and corporate commissions

Tatiana Suarez, USA; born and raised in Miami, she is one of the few women on display here and also one of the youngest at 29

Tavar Zawacki, USA; this Northern California native is famous for the up arrows in his work; he moved to Paris at 19 and is currently based in Berlin

Tats Cru, USA; this is a group of Bronx-based graffiti artists turned professional muralists and has created artwork for many musicians including Nicki Minaj, Missy Elliott, Metallica and Jennifer Lopez

Buff Monster, USA; born in Hawaii (and with a fine arts degree from USC), his work features happy characters living in brightly colored bubbly landscapes

Deih, Spain; this native of Valencia draws introspective pieces based on his life and feelings (I can't imagine what he's feeling in this work)

Joe Iurato, USA; the secret of Iurato’s work is the universal appeal of his figures - we are bound to love them, since they tell heart-warming stories about the human experience

Tristan Eaton, USA; Eaton is a Lollipop artist, street art muralist, illustrator and toy designer whose work is included in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York City