The Height of the Eastside Street Art Renaissance, feat. Suspish

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Last August, the brief renaissance of outer east Portlandia street art hit something of a zenith, most of it on the west wall of the building that the Portland Police Bureau's Sunshine Division - which is the PPB's charity public engagement arm - which is located just east of SE 122nd Ave on Stark St.

The west wall has no windows and faces onto the north parking lot of what was once was the Fabric Depot store, and is without a doubt, a honeypot no tagger can resist for long. So, when Suspish showed up on the east side again (the second appearance by the Eugene artist) it was plain that something was going to happen.

So: dateline, east of 122nd on Stark, August, 2023. We have this:

Now, I'm not necessarily a fan of graffiti either, and if you do it in Portland, in some areas, you take your life into your hands. So, if you're going to bring it, bring it memorably. Make it good, make it skillful, make it art. And our various artists who gave us this gallery-in-passing did just that.

First thing, we have on the far left here, is this:

... a big ol' blue-white-black tag, something of a signature, with FOE, East, and '23 and 2023 in various places. This took a little care and design forethought and engages the eye nicely.

Next we have ...

... another appearance from our friend Suspish. The Suspish fish is obvious; the abstract Cylopean face colored in a dusky mustard yellow is also Suspish's work, I believe. 

The mouse is some other artist's work, a johnny-come-lately to the gallery and while inspired and whimsical doesn't quite show the skill that Suspish and this next artist shows.

Speaking of the next artist, here we are:

The original work in this gallery, which I think I've posted about when it first showed up. These two were the first on the building a few months before, and the creativity and artistic skill here still delight my eye. To the credit of the Sunshine Division, they let this stand for a number of months before covering it over, and a lot of us eastbound Stark Street drivers got to enjoy them. 

I particularly adore the intensity of the dude with the spray cans. Chef's kiss here for that.

Again, the signature EAST FOE can be seen by the ear of the figure with the spray cans, so I think it was the same artist that did the big tag on the far left.

To close our gallery tour, this:

SWOOP. Another boi with a hat, and signed again, apparently, by FOE. 

The building has since been painted, and the west wall of the Sunshine Division's building hs returned to that industrial vaguely-oatmealy color. Graffiti - street art - has an expiration date. No matter how skillful it is, it's designed to leave us, as the property owner always has the last word.

Most of it is just lazy marks, but some of it, sometimes, gets really elevated. I hope Suspish comes up this way again eventually, and another visit or two from F.O.E. would not be amiss. 

They brought their A game here, and I was, curiously, happy to see it. 

More New Suspish on Stark Street, or, It Comes From Eugene

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When I saw SUSPISH on the back of the PPD Sunshine Division building on SE Stark just east of 122nd, I was delighted. I love the style of this artist and remembered, as I pointed out here, that we've seen them before.

But there's more delightfulness ... they've returned to the original building we first saw them on. 14410 SE Stark is a kind of a warehous-ey building that at one time, more than a decade ago, held a Hotel/Motel Furniture Liquidators. It closed around a decade ago and has stood vacant ever since. Now, the first time we saw Suspish, it was on the east wall of the building, the one that faces the Franz Bread Thrift Store next door. It was painted over in due time.

Now, it's on the buildings facade:

This differs from the other Suspish, in that we have the angler-fish catching its prey but, moreover, it's more or less the same as the first Suspish that appeared in April 2021, which I include here for comparison:

The addition of sparkles in the first image gives it a little more visual delight.

But there's more. That nifty web thing, the hashtag, accidentally showed me that Suspish isn't just a couple of fun graffiti on the outer east side of Portland. 

Suspish is a Eugene thing. perhaps come to visit, to stop by and leave something in a Banksy-esque way. Eugene Weekly spoke with The Artist back on 2022. They're something of a street-art city mascot down that way. 

The Return of SUSPISH! to Stark Street

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We have, out here in 122nd Land, the occasional recurring cartoon character in the form of graffiti.

Today, one came back. He's SUSPISH, and he's on the back of a building on the south side of Stark just east of 122nd that's exposed to the big north parking lot that still surrounds the former Fabric Depot:

I don't know who his friend is, but it looks like he's been in a scrape or two.

SUSPISH has formerly surfaced along Stark at 146th by the Franz Bakery Thrift store, either in a former anglerfish or perhaps it's a cousin, in April of 2021. We also sustained a very small invasion by friendly aliens back in April (coincidentally) of 2016). 

I do wonder if they are all done by the same local Banksy?