Dan Fontes was a muralist who worked in Oakland, California, best known for "Giraphics", the giraffes and zebras he painted beneath Interstate 580, and for "Emergent Sea Turtles" off Interstate 880. He died of cancer in April 2026 at the age of 67.

"Giraphics" is the work that made Dan Fontes widely known. It transformed the underbelly of Interstate 580 in Oakland with painted giraffes and zebras, using the tall, narrow proportions of the freeway support columns.

Where was the Dan Fontes memorial held?

The public memorial was held at the Pacific Pinball Museum, 1510 Webster St. in Alameda, California, from 6 to 10 p.m. on a Friday. It was open to the public.

Why is painting under a freeway difficult?

Viewers pass at speed, so detail is lost and only silhouette and colour register. Exhaust film and dust accumulate constantly, poor light darkens the colours, and freeway structures usually belong to a state transportation authority, making permission slower than for a city wall.

Graffiti News

Q: What was Fontes’ connection to the Pacific Pinball Museum?

Fontes served on the Pacific Pinball Museum’s board of directors and was an avid pinball collector, which is why the museum hosted the memorial.

Dan Fontes, who painted giraffes under Oakland's freeways

2026년 8월 25일 오전 08:440

Dan Fontes, a muralist who worked in Oakland, California, died of cancer in April 2026 at the age of 67. According to Patch, the Pacific Pinball Museum in Alameda held a public memorial in his honour.

The man who put giraffes on freeway columns

The work that made Fontes widely known is "Giraphics", which filled the underbelly of Interstate 580 with giraffes and zebras. He also left a large-scale installation, "Emergent Sea Turtles", off Interstate 880.

The choice of animal makes sense the moment you look at the format. A column holding up an elevated freeway is tall and narrow. Not many animals fit that proportion, and a giraffe is one of them. Murals where the subject genuinely suits the shape of the wall are rarer than they should be; more often a fixed image is stretched or squeezed to fit whatever surface is available.

He chose the places nobody looks at

The space under an elevated freeway is among the most neglected in any city. It is dark, loud, coated in exhaust residue, and passed through by car rather than walked. Painting there requires a completely different calculation from hanging work on a gallery wall.

The audience is moving at speed. Detail does not register; only silhouette and colour survive. Animals with unmistakable outlines — a giraffe, a zebra — are well suited to that constraint.

Maintenance is difficult. Traffic film and dust keep accumulating, and poor light makes colours read darker than they were mixed.

Permission is complicated. Freeway structures usually belong to a state transportation authority rather than the city, so the approval process is longer than for an ordinary city wall.

Choosing to work under those conditions repeatedly, over decades, is less a matter of taste than of stance.

The memorial

Patch reported that the memorial took place at the Pacific Pinball Museum, 1510 Webster St. in Alameda, from 6 to 10 p.m. on a Friday, and was open to the public. Fontes served on the museum's board of directors and was an avid pinball collector.

Kristine Holohan and Julie Lucchesi, who is Fontes' partner and who organised the gathering, said: "Dan gave so much color and joy to Oakland and the Bay Area. Let's gather to remember him the best way we know how, with community, music, pinball, and love."

Patch reported that the City of Oakland also planned to honour Fontes' cultural impact on the city.

What happens to a mural after its painter dies

The question an outdoor mural faces once its author is gone is a practical one. A mural is both an image and a piece of infrastructure, and its colour keeps leaving under ultraviolet light and exhaust. Without the original artist, repair becomes a judgement call: who repaints it, where restoration ends and re-creation begins, and who is entitled to decide.

Museum collections have procedures for this. Walls in the street usually do not. That is why the best-loved murals often either fade quietly after their maker dies, or survive as something visibly different from what was first painted.

Recording the walls you walk past

The practical lesson in Fontes' case is straightforward. The mural you pass every day will eventually go. A photograph and a location are frequently the only record that ends up surviving a painting.

The Wallscape map shows where people have logged street work, and the feed collects recent finds.

Source: Patch

Read original— Patch