Reykjavik street art

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January 3, 2017

I was recently in Iceland for a week or so and spent a fair amount of time wandering through Reykjavik, the capitol. It’s a really hip city that surprised me with how awesome it was. The city itself is very walkable with all of the shops and restaurants in close proximity, accessed by a pedestrian walk way and small streets. Throughout the downtown there are a ton of amazing restaurants and pubs, and even more shocking is how awesome the food is. It was a total surprise to me but honestly, I didn’t have one bad meal in Reykjavik – they have their food scene locked down! Even if you go into what might seem like a seedy dive bar, it’s pretty much the best burger and fries you’ve ever had. Needless to say I spent most of my time eating and drinking, I find it’s best to stick to what you’re good at, ya know?

While wandering downtown I noticed there are a ton of amazing building murals painted on the sides of buildings. Not just terribly thought out graffiti, but gorgeous pieces of art on the ENTIRE building. It turns out that about 10-15 years ago the city didn’t really pay much attention to unauthorized graffiti but in recent years (I assume with the influx of tourism) have started policing unapproved graffiti. In order to continue the tradition and keep the art scene alive many artists have begun to get approval from building owners to paint the murals, which in my opinion makes it even better. This way they get to spend the time planning and executing their piece and it also ensures that only talented artists get to graffiti the streets, win-win, if you ask me.

I should have taken more photos because there were so many unique murals, here are some of the ones I loved;