Tribute to Scan, a great Montreal writer

On Cabot street, part of the Sud-Oest neighborhood in Montreal, there is a long factory made of cinder blocks that has an enormous mural. It stretches about a city block, and looks to be at least 4 stories tall at least. I've often wanted to paint the scene because it appeared to feature a prominent graffiti artist, there is a large portrat of him holding a spray-paint can at the beginnig of the mural. Today I was on the location and noticed a big engraved metal plaque, the kind you see for historically important locations, and it told the story of 'Scan' who died in 2017, he was widely considered to be one of the greatest graffiti artist of all time and it seemed up to a hundred colleagues from Montreal, Canada and around the world had joined to make this monumental mural. Most of the wall is painted in turquoise, with white outlines and other designs throughout. To tackle such a scene I had to find a composition, and some kind of connection to the landscape... I rarely paint other people's artwork out of respect, so here I intgrated their ideas with my ideas. Graffiti artists put paint on the wall, but I put the wall onto my paintings!

When I saw the saturated red fire hydrant with yellow-green cap and orange-yellow snow marker (when the snow falls this allows the hydrant to be found in the winter if its needed), then I knew it would work, along with the cinder block textures, barred window, and one of many air conditioner units. Painting something like this on location leaves no room for errors, I had to establish the outline with a small brush, then fill in the details before applying a pale yellow wash, letting it dry mostly, then applying the turquoise layer which really pulled everything together. I added the letters 'SCAN' in the center of the composition which is barely discernable, but that was the idea. 
 

If you want to know more, or see the work of Scan, I found a link telling the whole story on a web site called wall-2-wall Montreal. Reading that link, I learned that graffiti artists prefer to call themselves 'writers', and they produce burners, tags, and throws. I don't know what those words mean but I'll look into it. Hey, if there were ever a wall to paint on (legally) I would be up for it. Check out The End of Art is Art (Ecipse Flowers). I did meet a 'writer' once, he was walking along the train track path when I painted Train Crossing, in fact, he talked to me for awhile and admired the painting and told me he paints on walls, I had included him in the Train Crossing painting, just a simple blue-clad figure in the distance. 

Tribute to Scan, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, October 2025