Graffiti News

A clubhouse wall gave the movement its start

Marol’s street-art movement began with a wall inside a housing society in 2015. According to Free Press Journal, Omkar Dhareshwar, founder of the art collective Wicked Broz, wanted more people to recognise the Mumbai neighbourhood where he grew up. After studying engineering, he began managing graffiti artists, which introduced him to street art and led him towards organising murals.

Dhareshwar connected with five Brazilian graffiti artists and proposed painting the clubhouse at his own housing society, Eco Park in Marol. Permission was initially refused, then granted after repeated requests. The artists completed the wall in a day. Dhareshwar recalled residents gathering that evening with food and drinks to celebrate the result.

The painting did not last: within two months, the wall was painted over. That early loss matters to the wider story because the movement continued despite it. Further walls inside the society became painting spaces, with artists from Sweden, Germany and South Africa among those joining the work.

Residents helped turn available walls into public landmarks

The movement spread through cooperation between artists and people who could offer walls. Free Press Journal reports that work moved beyond the residential compound into nearby parts of Marol, including chawls and public spaces. Dhareshwar described local residents as welcoming the paintings, while previously overlooked walls began drawing visitors.

The Military Road Residents Welfare Association (MRRWA) became an important intermediary during one of its neighbourhood cleanliness drives. According to Dhareshwar, willing artists were available, but walls were in short supply. The association encouraged housing societies and property owners to make surfaces available, helping the project expand.

For people following public art, this is a useful part of Marol’s story: access to a wall can shape a scene as much as the supply of artists. The report describes negotiations and neighbourhood relationships behind the pictures. Those relationships help explain how work inside one compound could become a feature of surrounding streets.

Dhareshwar identified the mural outside Vincent Pallotti Church as a defining moment. He said the artwork attracted wider attention, including politicians, visitors and social media creators. The church exterior therefore offers a named reference point in the account, although the report does not provide a complete visitor route.

Ladies-First made space for women graffiti artists

Wicked Broz also developed a women-focused initiative to encourage participation in graffiti. Dhareshwar told Free Press Journal that the aim included challenging assumptions about graffiti being a male field, both in society and within the graffiti community.

The source’s image captions connect the Ladies-First initiative with a mural by Shirin Shaikh on a nine-storey building. Another caption identifies a five-storey building painted by Krantinaar for the second edition. These examples place women’s participation at the scale of whole buildings. The report does not give exact addresses or creation dates for either work.

For a mural viewer, the programme adds another way to read the neighbourhood. Looking at who receives space to paint can be as revealing as looking at colour, subject or size. In Marol, opportunities for women artists sit alongside the resident cooperation that helped secure walls. Both are part of how the scene described in the report took shape.

Seeing Marol means allowing for changing walls

Marol’s murals should be understood as changeable works rather than a permanent outdoor collection. Dhareshwar stressed their limited lifespan and suggested that, if painting stopped, the neighbourhood could lose its colour over ten years. His remark expresses concern about continuity; it does not establish a lifespan for any particular mural.

Eco Park and the mural outside Vincent Pallotti Church are starting references for understanding the geography described by Free Press Journal. Before treating either as a viewing stop, check what is visible and where access is permitted. Some of the story takes place inside housing compounds, so a mention in the report should not be taken as permission to enter. Respect residents’ space when looking or taking photographs.

A visit can focus on how paintings relate to the buildings and streets around them, while allowing for repainting and disappearance. The first clubhouse wall is a reminder that photographs can preserve a work after the physical surface changes. Marol’s identity in this account rests on repeated participation as well as individual images.

Explore nearby street art on Wallscape’s map.

Source: Free Press Journal