Now you might be wondering why a site such as Mook Life is having an article on legal mural graffiti. Well to be honest with y’all, graffiti is not only about vandalizing and getting up but sometimes you need to be a good Samaritan and give back to the community that sheltered you. One of gentrification’s best ways to put a halt to bombing and raise a community’s housing prices is to hire street artists and pay them to paint a themed mural that the whole family will enjoy. If the buildings have colorful murals it will discourage illegal graffiti and gentrification will finally kick all those poor people out of our neighborhoods! Even better, legal murals give an opportunity for misled youth to voice their creativity and make something positive for the community. Better have them putting efforts into painting an advertisement for a local business than have them out on these streets joining gangs and acting like those degenerates we see every day on Mook-Life.com.
Without any further ado, let us show you today the fruit of their labor. We’ve assembled for you young artists’ creations that were sanctioned by the city or paid by businesses in order to give something back to the community and beautify Montreal’s neighborhoods. Like Hector Camacho in Style Wars says: ”Take it from the Champs, Graffiti is for Chumps!”. Here is an assortment of our favorite legal murals done by some of the most talented artists the graffiti scene has to offer:
This special mural was designed by a combination of Montreal and New York based artists. To the right we have NYC’s Yes2 and Miss17 and the TFB crew to the left. This symbiosis of different artist nationalities on one mural represent well the multicultural theme of the production. The American and Canadian connection come together to paint portraits of characters from different background under the city skyline, a positive message of unity for the children. We especially enjoy the yellow dripping splashes of funk on each extremity that adds a surrealist motif to the entire composition.
TOS crew definitely need to be mentioned when it comes to the creation of legal murals. We have here an excellent silver colored lineup that matches perfectly the kitchen themed background they concocted. Another mural they’ve done to promote local business. I believe the building this is on is a grocery store, hence the food-themed art TOS crew was contracted to do for this business.
Fomer designed a cartoonish mural the kids are sure to enjoy. In this nature-themed production, he chose green color letters to perfectly match the trees and grass background he mapped out. Look at that dude with shades walking his dog… wow, my man Fomer got some character drawing skills!
Sometimes small street corner murals will definitely brighten up a degrading neighborhood. Here we see this bubblegum colored theme has given life to this garbage-ridden street. The artist definitely wanted to give contrast by using silver with his pink and aqua ecstacy-trip background. Even OG’s Saiko and Cose approve!
When Original Mook Killa-EF is not out on these streets causing ruckus and drinking the night away, he is giving back to the community by painting park-themed murals with the help of other New York and Montreal cats. We see EF’s character drawing skills here as he portrays a man reading a newspaper on a bench instead of drinking a forty on it. Parks are made for normal people too!
Niel and Rusto show tribute to some sort of Aztec or aboriginal culture by painting a beautiful character to pefectly match their bubble letters. I’m sure there is an entire socio-cultural message behind their choice of black and white color scheme letters, but I’ll leave it up to these artists to explain at their next vernissage.
Nature always seems to be a recurring theme in contracted legal murals. You see, artists such as Dock, Sewer, Shok, Merp and Fomer are very zen people and their spirit is in symbiosis with Mother Earth. Therefore it’s only normal that their inspiration will help them create a beautiful eco-friendly mural full of greens, trees and mountain backgrounds. This mural is a breath of fresh air in our polluted city.
Another nature-themed environment done by our local talent. This time however, they’ve decided to use a different artistic approach and contrast dark colored letters to their green farmland background. The punchline ‘Beast from the East’ is most likely there to describe the variety of farm Animals we find on the East Coast of Canada, a very witty and informative communication that adds knowledge to the rural background they drew for this business.
This western styled bar hired some of our local talent to promote the cowboy state of mind with a desert theme. These young artists integrated white and yellow lettering to melt into their Texas-styled mountainous background they meticulously put together. This mural is a definite masterpiece that will attract all the local Rosemont fiends to drink and rigodon the night away.
Construction is a spreading disease through the streets of Montreal as much as illegal graffiti. The city’s solution to beautify buildings in the process of renovation is to ask local artists to add a little bit of color into our local decrepit housing.
One may recognize the famous Coco Rico restaurant on St-Laurent from its cartoonish mural. However, revamping its image is always a good marketing tool for any upcoming business in this world of corporate competition. In order to assure a new look to their facade, they’ve hired Vibo to add an urban look to the wonderful world of talking chickens and portuguese food.
These two artists are definite innovators in the legal mural contract movement. These good samaritans are some of the first in the city to approach legal businesses in order to create legal murals for promotion and pay. It seems that a man walking his dog is a recurring theme for Big Fomz… I guess it’s his signature character.
Another FR and LS collabo to reminisce the vibrant colors of the 80′s.
June 12th, 2011 at 10:07 pm
that hand conecting to the fomer is crazy
June 12th, 2011 at 11:19 pm
oh isnt it great that graffiti can now be used in a legal and civilized fashion
June 13th, 2011 at 12:15 am
Peep the KILLA-EF hand in the doorway in the last pic.
June 13th, 2011 at 12:34 am
before seeing any of the pictures, i read that first part and thought that this is gonna be pretty lame, once i saw the first pics i started laughing my ass off. best post in my opinion
June 13th, 2011 at 5:22 am
j’aime !
June 13th, 2011 at 9:19 am
LOL. Hector Macho Camacho. Hilarious.
June 13th, 2011 at 11:26 am
Hahahaha, That’s pretty much what’s cracking in Woodside Queens also. Sometimes the bombs are as shitty as the murals are though, actually most of the time they’re just as shitty.
June 13th, 2011 at 12:13 pm
FUnniest shit EVER!!!
June 13th, 2011 at 1:19 pm
I found this article very articulate, professional and thought provoking.
June 13th, 2011 at 1:50 pm
hahaha this is a awesome post. i always bomb murals, fuck the hatters.
June 13th, 2011 at 2:21 pm
I read two times and decided to react…
Its crazy how we are stuck here in that legal, illegal limiting thing here … When ur livin in dictatorship, in a real context of deep repression and you need your voice to be heard, pour une question de vie ou de mort, you dont give a damn about being legal or illegal, u just struggle to be heard. You can give your life whatever to give back to your comunity and being heard. There’s a lot of people who would love only to breath and express themselves “legally” up here… Its funny thing up here ok but I was looking at that bomber over the aboriginal painting… What is funny really? Graffiti and Street art is about resistence too… Graffiti comes very far and for me to see a bomber over an aboriginal representation, its super colonisator… There’s so much advertisings, multinationals, politicians and real figures to attack and front, why should we loose our times destroying an art piece representing a culture that have been genocide … The best graffiti artists I met in the world have a discipline, a respect and a vision of destroying at the right place… Its only an opinion.. but there’s so much others places to hit in Babylone…
June 13th, 2011 at 2:40 pm
LOL^^ Wall of text.
PS
I like turtles.
June 13th, 2011 at 3:09 pm
It’s cool if you do legals, but it ain’t my thing. I bomb BECAUSE its illegal, as a bit of a fuck you to the government, and even better it’s with something artistic and enjoyable. I give back to the community in the way that I pay my taxes. That should be enough.
June 13th, 2011 at 3:57 pm
Sick. really nice Nixon and Loes on stlaurent.
June 13th, 2011 at 4:08 pm
Not trying to offend anyone…. Only sharing a personal feeling seeing so much issues in differents comunities here and abroad and how graffiti and art can empowers comunities around the world. And paying my taxes, I don’t feel its enough to give back to the comunities because they dont give a damn about it…
Always feeled that the essence of Hip-Hop was roots in that struggle of uniting and empowers comunities keeping knowledge in movement…. Its cool to erase what we wanna fuck and elitist representations but something need to be built too… I love how Mook-Life provokes and presents things sometimes but here I need to react…
That same institutionalized society that we all wanna “fuck” in each our way was builted on native lands and I would hope that there could be more art and representations of this important legacy in this false grey jungle, on the street so we can remember what exists before they raped this millenary heritage!
That’s it
Nothing to be offend 
June 13th, 2011 at 4:14 pm
You are thinking to deep in to the matter. These kids don’t give a shit, they are mooks. No mural will make up to what happened to the natives. No graffiti will change the way our government treats us. This is entertainment. Instead of crying about it, we find it funny.
June 13th, 2011 at 6:15 pm
Besides, just because graf is an element of hiphop, doesn’t mean everyone writing loves hiphop.
Sure, most people do, but save the outdated “pillars of hiphop” talk for a blog that doesn’t post photos of diarrhea on a wall and dead animal bones and such.
Props to the cheap alcohol and late night necessity store in the last pic.
June 13th, 2011 at 6:54 pm
aisha…come drain me out while we talk about your problem
June 13th, 2011 at 9:07 pm
You missed the ugly as shit mural next to the Jacques-Cartier bridge that said ”De quoi t’aurais l’air si t’avais pas d’air?”. If I remember well, Ceos, Nixon, Loes and Fomer covered that shit.
June 13th, 2011 at 9:15 pm
>post about purity legal murals
>all murals bombed by local crews
needless to say, i lol’d
keep on mookin’ on, mes amis
June 13th, 2011 at 10:07 pm
arreter guys, il ne faut pas toucher les streets art des gens…c jolie est sa fait changement que le gribouage sur cest mur…. and WTF IM SAYING PRENNEZ LA FAT CAPS et enleve se street art par la vrai beautéeeeee
June 13th, 2011 at 11:22 pm
La première murale en passant avec les étoiles étaient dédiés à des femmes qui se sont littéralement faits assassinés, disparues et victimes de violence sexuelles et dont les familles luttent pour avoir justice aujourd’hui. L’art de rue sert aussi de porte-voix à des histoires invisibles qui ne sont pas racontés dans les journaux. Pour certain, une murale comme cela c’est simple, c’est de la merde. Pour les familles des victimes, des femmes disparus ça avait une grande valeur qui a rien à voir avec l’argent de la ville…
June 14th, 2011 at 12:06 am
Je suis d’accord avec Aishaa, c’est pas au fait que ces graffs soient subventionnés ou pas, mais bien la signification qui est en arrière. Concernant la première murale, j’ai moi-même perdu ma propre cousine qui a été enlevée et portée disparue depuis presque 3 ans et j’trouve pas ça drôle dutout. Les journalistes s’en foutent et on essaye par tous les moyens de sensibiliser cette cause et ça ne marche pas toujours. La murale était un moyen d’attirer l’attention pour faire avancer la cause. Vous avez vraiment rien à foutre, je plains vos vies. Ces murales n’étaient p-e pas beaux à vos ti yeux mais les jeunes qui ont fait ces graffs, p-e qu’ils n’avaient pas l’expérience ni le talent de certains, mais ils l’ont fait avec leur coeur et ils devaient en être fiers. Shame on you….
June 14th, 2011 at 1:10 am
LIFE’S A BITCHH.. NOTHING WILL MAKE EVERYONE HAPPY.
June 14th, 2011 at 4:09 pm
ahhahaah “beat from the east” is to describe various farm animals..classic!
June 14th, 2011 at 5:26 pm
wow, comments 22 and 23 sucked. the best part of the posts are reading the comments and those ones dont belong here. anyways sick post SD wasnt expecting the bombing, was awesome!
June 14th, 2011 at 6:42 pm
Dope post.
June 14th, 2011 at 7:21 pm
Aishaa and Mikis go cry somewhere else. Nobody gives a fuck about those murals.
June 15th, 2011 at 2:33 am
les bateaux qui volent dans les étoiles représentent vraiment des femmes assassinées ? c’est fucked up…
June 16th, 2011 at 11:15 am
”Parks are made for normal people too!” hahahahahahahahha
June 20th, 2011 at 9:46 am
I’d rather look at this shit while standing around waiting for the 51 or walking thru DG blazed outta my head than some dude’s abs in a black-and-white JEANS BUFFALO ad or the STM telling me I’m part of a ‘collective movement’ because I’m too poor to buy a car.
June 20th, 2011 at 2:00 pm
Les seuls commentaires pertinent sont en fait ceux de Mikis et Aishaa.
Je suis une travailleuse du sexe. Et je n’ai peut-être pas autant de talent que plusieurs d’entre vous, mais j’était présente lors de la création de la murale fait en honneur aux femmes assassinées par Pickton.
Je vous trouve complètement irrespectueux. Peux-être que vous vous en calisser que des femmes se fassent assassiner, batter et violer. Mais moi ça m’ébranle et je ne suis pas la seule.
Cette murale représentait beaucoup pour toute la communauté montréalaise de travailleuses et travailleurs du sexe.
June 20th, 2011 at 3:59 pm
Just for the record, nobody from Mook-Life actually did any of these murals… We just documented it. So if YOU MAD, it ain’t our fucking problem. Do you get mad at TQS when they report horrible things? If yes, then you are clearly fucking stupid.
June 21st, 2011 at 3:42 am
These murals mean shit fuck all and don’t represent anybody. I think if you really want a memorial for whoever, a graffiti mural ain’t your answer. The way I see it, walls are for the public and the dude who covers your mural with a massive throw-up is invoking the same rights that the mural painter did when they did their thing. Free muhfuckin’ Speech
June 22nd, 2011 at 5:27 pm
Fucking hilarious. This made my whole fuckin week. Thank you mook life.
June 23rd, 2011 at 3:37 pm
fuckin hilarious man dope one these guys are super heroes man giving back to the community and such wordup!!
June 28th, 2011 at 12:53 pm
Les bons samaritains!