Bordaloii Mural @ 80 Almont St

This public artwork in Lynn is by Bordalo II, the Lisbon artist who turns discarded trash into small and large-scale pieces installed around the world. His work questions a materialistic, consumerist society, focusing on how the excessive production of things creates constant waste and harms the planet. That waste becomes his raw material, and he intends the finished pieces above all as a universal manifesto. His series Big Trash Animals is built around drawing attention to the same problem.

The artist’s name is a tribute to his grandfather, the painter Real Bordalo, whose passion for watercolors filled his youth alongside adventures in illegal graffiti in Lisbon’s underworld. Eight years at the Fine Arts Faculty of Lisbon led him to sculpture and experimentation with various materials, drawing him away from painting. Public space then became his chosen canvas for exploring color and scale, and the place where he developed his current artistic practice.

What to Know

• The artist was born Artur Bordalo in Lisbon in 1987.
• The Lynn installation was organized by Beyond Walls.
• The work is listed by the Downtown Lynn Cultural District.