Best Murals in Lisbon, Portugal

Murals in Lisbon: How Portugal’s Grittiest Neighborhoods Became Works of Art

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It’s rare that we venture to a big city anymore and don’t immediately find the street art. I’m not sure if murals gravitate toward us, or we to them, if it’s become a global movement or if we’re just more attune to our surroundings than most. Whatever it is, the world has become more colorful and I, for one, love it.

Lisbon Murals: Where to Find the Best Street Art

“The only thing one can give an artist is leisure in which to work. To give an artist leisure is actually to take part in his creation.” —Ezra Pound

However, when we arrived in Lisbon in July, a startling thing happened. We saw relatively no murals. OK, maybe “none” is a bit of an overstatement, but “hardly any” is accurate; there’s graffiti everywhere, but actual intentional murals are harder to come by, other than a Vhils installation here and there.

Lisbon Murals: Where to Find the Best Street Art

We spent the first three days roaming around keeping our eyes peeled for signs of urban art, and only spotted a couple, mostly in the more heavily-traveled tourist districts. And I’m convinced we would have never seen any beyond this were it not for a chance encounter with a cafe owner.

Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon

On day four of our workshop, we took the afternoon off when the crew headed to a styled shoot on a beach. The WiFi in our Airbnb was virtually non-existent, so we posted up at Brick Café near our accommodation in Anjos to get some work done. We’d been there nearly two hours when the owner came and kindly asked us to leave; at lunchtime, apparently, they don’t allow those with laptops to use the Internet.

SVV, immediately identifying that the owner’s English was fairly solid, struck up a conversation about art. “Where would you go if you wanted to see Lisbon’s best street art?” he asked him. Like all the other English-speaking Portuguese we had encountered, he tried to tell us about the graffiti. “No,” SVV interrupted him, “we mean, like actual murals. Commissioned. Large-scale.”

Nuno then stopped and pondered the question. “Well,” he started, “there are some. But they’re in an area that’s not too safe and you won’t find any other tourists.” To which we responded, “perfect! Send us there.” And so he scrawled the words “Bairro Padre Cruz” across a sheet of paper he ripped out of his notepad, and off we went.

Introducing Bairro Padre Cruz

To start off, let me tell you a little bit about Padre Cruz. It’s not exactly unsafe per se—at least not in daylight hours—but you would never stumble upon it randomly. What Nuno said, that it was far from the beating heart of Lisbon, was true. It’s a good 10 kilometers—or a 25-minute cab ride—out there from downtown, and a ways walk from a metro stop. When we arrived, at high noon, there were hardly any people around. Padre Cruz is very much a residential area, so I imagine its residents were at school or work. But what we found was absolutely, positively startling.

Best Murals in Lisbon

There were, literally, hundreds of murals. Every single apartment building had one on each end of it. It was stunning. It was remarkable. It was unexpected.

Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon

Best Murals in Lisbon

We didn’t know where to start, so we took out our cameras and spent at least an hour crisscrossing between the five-story buildings, our camera shutters clicking quickly in sync, wanting to photograph every last thing we saw.

Best Murals in Lisbon

Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon

Best Murals in Lisbon

Then, we set off into the neighborhoods, two-story homes that formed a grid system just beyond the apartment complexes. Even outside of the high-rises, there were murals. Murals on every easement, murals on the side of many of the houses—murals, murals, everywhere!

Best Murals in Lisbon

Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon

Have you ever been so beautifully overwhelmed by something that you nearly cried? That’s how I felt as we soaked in it all, not another tourist around and the lone resident eyeing us suspiciously, not accustomed to seeing outsiders in the middle of a weekday perusing their neighborhood with such wonder.

Best Murals in Lisbon

Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon

Best Murals in Lisbon

But how did this place come to be? And why did it not show up in any Google search for “murals in Lisbon?” After seeing a “Boutique da Cultura” inscription on one of the murals, we did some digging when we got back home and found a few missing pieces of the puzzle.

Best Murals in Lisbon

Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon

Best Murals in Lisbon

Two years ago, Galeria de Arte Urbana organized its inaugural Muro Urban Art Festival by inviting artists from all over to come jazz up its bland buildings, transforming Padre Cruz into The Public Gallery of Urban Art, which today comprises more than 100 murals and is one of the largest street-art corridors in all of Europe.

Best Murals in Lisbon

Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon

Previously, Padre Cruz was home to some of the oldest graffiti in Lisbon, and as one of the city’s more disadvantaged areas it was an obvious target for the home of a major beautification effort like this one.

Best Murals in Lisbon, Portugal

 

Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon

Best Murals in Lisbon, Portugal

Marvila also has murals

The following afternoon, our next to last day in Lisbon, I was trying to find a neighborhood we had yet to explore. I heard about an open-air art museum in Marvila, so a few of the workshop attendees tagged along and we made our way there. The museum was closed, so—true to form—we ended up in a brewery instead.

Murals in Lisbon's Marvila Neighborhood

At that brewery, I started talking to the owner and the taproom manager. A similar conversation to that with Nuno ensued, and they directed us over an old train track to the Biblioteca de Marvila, the old library, around the corner from which was a similar residential neighborhood to Padre Cruz—meaning, you couldn’t throw a stone without hitting a mural.

Murals in Lisbon's Marvila Neighborhood

Marvila is a similar layout to Padre Cruz: five-story apartment buildings with a mural on each end. You really have to put in your mileage to see them all, as the area is quite expansive and these works of art often hide from plain sight, despite their towering height.

Murals in Lisbon's Marvila Neighborhood

Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon

Kobra Mural in Lisbon, Portugal

In 2017, Marvila was the site of the second Muro – Festival de Arte Urbana de Lisbo, the same festival that transformed Padre Cruz the previous year. Marvila is much closer to downtown; it was just a 10-minute cab ride, if that, from where we were staying in Anjos. It’s also not one you would accidentally stumble upon while playing tourist, so you have to actively seek it and its brilliant artwork out. I kind of like that: a mural Easter egg hunt.

Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon

While traversing Marvila, we even saw a Kobra! I’d recognize this famed Brazilian artist’s signature style anywhere. It’s clear they brought in some of the world’s top mural talent judging by the caliber and sheer size of art alone.

Kobra Mural in Lisbon, Portugal

It was really fun guiding our group of explorers and showing them how SVV and I travel, which is by talking to actual humans—living our motto “face-to-face is the new digital”—and wandering without an agenda, particularly as they are fellow photographers who had a blast interacting with the art, too.

Murals in Lisbon's Marvila Neighborhood

Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon

Murals in Lisbon's Marvila Neighborhood

Portugal has figured out what so many American cities are beginning to discover—and what we’ve tried to convince our own small conservative Southern town of: that, beyond merely driving tourism, murals have the power to alter a space, to change an environment.

Best Murals in Lisbon

Sometimes all it takes is a little paint to freshen up a place, give its residents hope and turn it into a destination for seekers of beauty like us. It’s a wonder every city isn’t following Lisbon’s lead to assist in the evolution of their poorer areas.

Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon

Murals in Lisbon's Marvila Neighborhood

And we found it all by striking up a simple conversation: first, with a cafe owner, and then with a brewery manager. It took some prodding on both ends—it seems mural-hunting is not something common in Lisbon, so they were both a bit suspect as to why we would go to these “ghettos” (their words, not ours) voluntarily—but had we not put in the time, we might never have found what both of us agree was our favorite part of Lisbon on this trip, these open-air urban art museums, free and welcoming of all.

Murals in Lisbon's Marvila Neighborhood

Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon

Lisbon Murals: Where to Find the Best Street Art

Best Murals in Lisbon
Best Murals in Lisbon

 

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Lisbon Murals: The Best Street Art in Portugal
Lisbon Murals: The Best Street Art in Portugal
Lisbon Murals: The Best Street Art in Portugal
COMMENTS
  • October 21, 2018

    Ahhh! These murals are amazing! I especially loved the Kobra mural in Marvila. There is so much color and emotion in these. I hardcore heart this.

    • October 21, 2018

      I’m a hardcore Kobra fan, so that was a favorite of mine, too! Heading to Chicago with my mom this week and definitely plan to track down his work there.

  • October 21, 2018

    I LOVE your Portugal round-ups. It has been too long since I’ve visited. One place I’m very curious about is the Azores. I think you said it was more of a personal rather than professional vacation for you, but is there any chance you would write a small recap?

    • October 21, 2018

      Absolutely, Tierney! I’ve been dying to share everything we found in the Azores and have that post on the docket for the next few weeks, these kind of posts with so many photos just take me several days to edit/write/put together, and I’ve been on the road a lot this fall for other projects so have yet to have the time (tl;dr – I need to take less photos and be home more, ha). But I promise to do a deep-dive as soon as I can cull through all my content from there 🙂

      P.S. Thank you!

  • October 21, 2018

    Stunning! Amazing art and beautiful photos!

    • October 21, 2018

      Thank you, Shani! Some of the prettiest I’ve seen anywhere.

  • October 22, 2018
    Joan van Velsor

    Thank you for bringing those astonishing, beautiful murals home with you, and sharing them. What a difference it must have made to the residents view of their home.
    This is an example many cities in the US should follow.

    • October 23, 2018

      Exactly my thought! Sounds like Sacramento is doing just that.

  • October 22, 2018
    Briel K.

    Wow, that’s incredible how many murals there were and in so many different styles! Very cool that the towns put in the effort to have them done!

    • October 23, 2018

      Isn’t it amazing? I really wish more cities in the US would take their lead!

  • October 23, 2018

    The murals are magnificent! So vibrant and full of colour. Makes a place so lively!

    • October 23, 2018

      It really does! Who would have ever imagined this could be done in a poorer area full of ubiquitous, bland high-rises?

  • October 27, 2018

    Stop it with all those beautiful murals! “I’m not sure if murals gravitate toward us, or we to them”. I have the feeling murals run away from me 🙂

  • October 27, 2018

    Wow! These murals are incredible! I’d love to explore these areas of Lisbon on my next trip!

    Jaz
    http://www.thelifeofasocialbutterfly.co.uk

  • September 15, 2019
    Mimi

    Beautiful mural. I am in lisbon & one day to see Murals. Any suggestion where should I go first. I am in city, Biaxa neighborhood. Your photos & write up, amazing & moving.

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