Graffiti News

A three-storey mural of Gord Downie is being painted in downtown Kingston, Ontario. The Kingston Whig-Standard reported on 31 July 2026 that the work is going up on the side of 172 Wellington Street and centres on the late singer of The Tragically Hip.

Who is painting it, and for whom

The artist is Kingston-born Aaron Forsyth, who works under the name EronOne. According to the Kingston Whig-Standard, he is a self-taught public artist who uses spray paint as his medium, and his work is recognised across the city. That includes the Agnes Etherington Art Centre's "Transformation" graffiti wall, which has since been removed for renovations.

The mural was commissioned by Tourism Kingston. It forms part of the City of Kingston's Forever Hip programme, which marks the tenth anniversary of The Tragically Hip's final concert in August 2016. Forsyth began the mural in June 2026, and the Kingston Whig-Standard photographed it in progress on 23 July 2026.

What the mural shows

The mural draws on imagery from The Hip's final concert, with a large portrait of Gord Downie at its centre. Forsyth explained the placement: "I have Gord Downie very large, close to the sidewalk. You can't miss it, it's larger than life, being that he was like a larger-than-life figure."

The finished work is set to take up three storeys, a scale Forsyth described as an honour.

The weight of a hometown commission

A commission this visible carries pressure. "(Creating the mural is) a big task to take on. The band is iconic, and being that they're so well known and they're from Kingston, I feel like it's a big responsibility to represent that," Forsyth told the Kingston Whig-Standard. "As a Kingstonian, it's an honour, and almost like a daunting task, because it's a very prominent location, and I know lots of eyes will be on it."

Why public art reaches people galleries do not

Forsyth said Kingston has been embracing public art, and that it adds something to the city. "(Public art) really can create community, giving people something to talk about or to share, as people, as passersby seeing the same thing," he said.

He returned to the question of who art actually reaches. "(Public art) is something for everyone. It's not just people that are aware of art galleries and go to them on a regular basis (…) any passerby on their day to day will see and have large art in their face."

Commissioned walls and unsanctioned ones

The Downie mural sits clearly on one side of street art's divide. It was ordered by a city tourism body, its address is public, and its completion is timed to a festival calendar. On the other side is work painted without permission that can be gone within days. The two often share tools and technique, and plenty of artists move from one to the other, as Forsyth did — he told the Kingston Whig-Standard that a childhood trip to Toronto introduced him to street art.

The fate of the "Transformation" wall is a reminder that commissioned work is not permanent either: it was removed for renovations. Most walls in a city are temporary. Wallscape's map and feed exist to hold what is on them right now, tied to where it stands.