Frame Your Neighborhood is a series of four street art murals by native West Palm Beach artist…read moreHector Diaz. Diaz worked in advertising and as a graphic artist before turning to street art 25 years ago. He is now specializing in making anamorphic art. This kind of art changes, moves perspective, and morphs when viewed through a cell phone or app. First he takes an image into Photoshop, stretches and elongates it, and then paints it flat on the ground surface so that it comes together when viewed through a camera phone. I have seen this kind of art before with chalk painters at street festivals but this is the first time I have seen it done with murals. A circle near the mural tells where to stand to take the picture of it. The four murals Diaz completed for West Palm Beach Art in Public Places are in city parks and are meant to bring awareness to water resources and wildlife. Each mural is unique to its surroundings. This is the first mural in the series and it was completed in South Olive Park next to the kiddie splash pad. This mural features two manatees curiously peaking up from the water on the sidewalk. Florida manatees have only recently been removed from the endangered status list, although they still remain threatened. I love that this mural highlights this beloved Florida marine mammal.

Laps is a temporary art installation on the lawn at Old School Square sponsored by the Delray Beach…read moreDowntown Development Authority. There is a garage nearby and some limited street parking. Launched on June 22nd, LAPS consists of six, eight foot high lighted hourglasses that you can spin so the ping pong balls drop through to the other side. "The message of the installation is that because everyone gets to choose the time they want to spend at the exhibit, each is a keeper of their own passage of time." The LAPS exhibit was designed and created in Montreal, Canada in 2022 by Olivier Landreville, with sound and light design by Serge Maheu. Structure and engineering were provided by Maintenance Industries Meca-Fab Inc. The interactive installation is produced by Init and Creos. Prior to being displayed in Delray Beach, it was on exhibit in Montreal, Canada; Des Moines, ID; Ottawa, Canada; and Denver, CO. I love how interactive this art is. You really have to spin the wheel to get them to turn so you get a bit of an arm workout. Come see and play before time runs out on July 30th.

Located in the back of Jaycee Park is a cool little piece of local art. It Embraces the swordfish,…read morecertainly and iconic creature here in South Florida. We need these little quirks to help Define our communities. I enjoyed my walk around this park that I enjoyed finding this little sculpture.

I discovered this colorful public artwork at the entrance to the Spanish River Library. As part of…read moreBoca Raton's 100th anniversary celebration, the City unveiled Palm Trees Sway as part of its Plastic Poetry public art series. This Centennial initiative celebrates Boca Raton's unique character through community-inspired poetry, recycled materials, and public art placed in unexpected locations throughout the city. Plastic Poetry was commissioned by Public Art Boca in collaboration with O, Miami and Free Plastic. The Ode to Boca series transforms recycled plastic waste into five-line poems inspired by the digits of Boca Raton's ZIP codes. The words, written by local residents, reflect the city's spirit, stories, and natural beauty. Each letter was crafted from recycled polypropylene collected during local cleanups. The plastic was melted and molded into colorful, durable 5-inch letters. Palm Trees Sway incorporates 7.32 pounds of recycled plastic. Palm Trees Sway features a poem by Boca Raton resident Jennifer, whose verse captures the peaceful rhythm of life by the ocean: Palm trees sway Ocean breeze whispers Sunrise paints the sky A century of learning, Young minds growing -- Jennifer Ferris I love how this series is a blend of art, recycling, and Boca Raton pride. In front of the artwork is a garden of flowers further tying it to a message of environmental protection. This meaningful addition to the entrance is well worth taking a moment to appreciate before entering the library.

My East is Your West is a public art piece in The Square in West Palm Beach. The animated light…read moreinstallation sits on top of a building in The Square. The thought provoking piece was created by Mumbai-based artist Shilpa Gupta who is known for using technology and typefaces in her work which aligns with her interest in languages and contemporary communication systems. About her thought provoking piece, Gupta has said "My East Is Your West, based on an ongoing outdoor light installation, celebrates multiplicity where an individual can function within and beyond and even play with definitions. Through a series of objects, prints and moving images, my work will deal with the tension between the self, as a citizen, and the surrounding nation; their conflicting aspirations and desires for each other and themselves. Perception, time, location and construction of knowledge are overlapping interests that bring both the artists together, but we freely explore it from various tangents." Upon examining the art work it looks like a jumble of letters, WMYEIAOSUTR but then they light up revealing the title of the piece. It is meant to make the viewer reflect on social, political. and geographical boundaries. I had trouble understanding the piece until the individual words started lighting up. West Palm Beach has world class art museums and public art that fosters cultural discussions. My East is Your West is a welcome addition to the conversation.

My husband is a Florida native who grew up in South Florida. He remembers that the grocery store…read morenear his house had separate water fountains and separate bathrooms. I grew up in the north. I never saw any of this. And I certainly never would have imagined that a town would have built a separation barrier between neighborhoods based on race. This wall was built in 1954 as an unofficial border between the white and black neighborhoods. It is over a thousand feet long and made of cinder blocks. After the civil rights act, some things changed. In 1984 the first mural was done. In 2021 the community of artists and volunteers came back together to repaint the wall with their new interpretations of the community history, the American history, and equal rights for all including the Caribbean and other areas. You will see some famous people represented by quotes and images -- like Martin Luther King and Frieda Kahlo. One interesting local person pictured is Retha Lowe. She became the city's first black commissioner (in 1994!) and later was the vice mayor. Even without the history, the wall mural is a work of local art. With the history, it's a tribute to the community banding together to turn a former negative into a beautiful positive.

In the south end of Lake Worth Beach in 1954, a six-foot-high, 1,175-foot-long wall was built along…read moreWingfield Street to separate the Black and white communities. It is believed that the wall was created because the Federal Housing Administration actively enforced policies that refused to insure mortgages in or near Black neighborhoods, a practice known as redlining. This federal policy mandated segregated housing by favoring loans for new, white-only suburban developments over established urban areas. As a result, Black people were prevented from owning homes and accumulating wealth, creating lasting residential segregation. The wall served as an unofficial border between the residents of the Osborne Colored Addition and their white neighbors in Whispering Palms. The Lake Worth Beach zoning code required all Black residents to live in the Osborne subdivision until 1969. In 1994, the wall was rebranded as the Wall of Unity after years of neglect. A mural depicting people of different races and Martin Luther King Jr. was painted on the wall. Over the years, the mural faded, chunks of concrete broke off, and graffiti was added. In 2021, Healthier Lake Worth Beach, a Palm Health Foundation initiative, decided to use this dividing structure to bring people together by turning the wall into a new canvas. After discussions about tearing the wall down, it was decided to leave it standing to educate people about the past. The wall was repaired, and sixty-seven South Florida professional artists and residents helped paint murals representing the past, present, and future of the Lake Worth Beach community. The artists worked to change the narrative of the wall from one of exclusion to one of inclusion. This is a part of Lake Worth Beach history that should be experienced in person. You cannot fully appreciate the scale of the wall through pictures alone. It stretches for several blocks, and it would take quite a walk to see everything. I was only able to capture a few images of it. Some of my favorites were the handprints on Leaves of One Tree, a painting of City Hall, a tree displaying the names of families from the Osborne Colored Addition, Mexican astronaut José M. Hernández, St. John's Episcopal Church, and the indigenous Jaega Tribe. I think it would take more than one trip to truly see everything. The wall is also a stop on the Palm Beach County Black Cultural Heritage Trail.

Frame Your Neighborhood is a series of four street art murals by artist Hector Diaz. Diaz worked in…read moreadvertising and as a graphic artist before turning to street art 25 years ago. He is now specializing in making anamorphic art. This kind of art changes, moves perspective, and morphs when viewed through a cell phone or app. First he takes an image into Photoshop, stretches and elongates it, and then paints it flat on the ground surface so that it comes together when viewed through a camera phone. I have seen this kind of art before with chalk painters at street festivals but this is the first time I have seen it done with murals. A circle near the mural tells where to stand to take the picture of it. The four murals Diaz completed for West Palm Beach Art in Public Places are in city parks and are meant to bring awareness to water resources and wildlife. Each mural is unique to its surroundings. The second mural was completed in Howard Park and it is of a gentle looking alligator next to the wetlands area where you might find a real alligator swimming around. It looks like the alligator is swimming in a pool in the sidewalk with lily pads and turtles. The mural was completed over two days using acrylic paint and then sealed. This small wetlands area at the north end of the park was once the Stub Canal and Turning Basin. It was large enough for barges that carried passengers and produce from Belle Glade to turn around in. Boat service started on May 17,1918. After a railroad line and highway opened in the 1920's, boat travel to fell out of favor and the 1928 Hurricane destroyed the boat docks. Now all that is left is what looks like a small retention pond with a fountain. Diaz decided to create this mural as a tribute to the history of the turning basin. I love alligators, nature, and photography and this mural brings together all three so this was a fun discovery to make in the park.

The vibrant sculpture on the corner of Ocean Blvd and US-1 is in front of 500 Ocean. It is a…read moretowering 40-foot installation by metal artist Albert Paley. Commissioned for the development and installed in 2017, it remains the tallest public artwork in Palm Beach County. Paley describes Cavalcade as a dramatic silhouette meant to engage the sky and sunlight. The sculpture's spire-like forms, painted in vibrant yellows, are inspired by palm fronds, which he sees as delicate floral elements reaching skyward. Though the piece is not kinetic, its folded, interlaced metal shapes suggest motion as if stirred by ocean air. Paley emphasizes how the sculpture changes throughout the day, with shifting light and shadow enhancing its dynamism and creating a sense of constant transformation. When I first saw it, I was struck by how it seemed to rise out of the pavement like a burst of energy--part botanical, part industrial, and entirely alive. More than marking the corner, it claims it. The sculpture feels like welcome sign for the neighborhood that blends ambition with artistry. While fully metal and status, it channels the softness of nature. [Review 1367 of 2025 - 2135 in Florida - 24919 overall]

Cavalcade is a 40 foot high public art installation by artist Albert Paley. It was created…read morespecifically for Boynton Beach and installed in 2017. The artist based the design on his interpretation of palm fronds. He also designed it to have folding metal to look like it had movement even though it is stationary. Albert Paley's work can be found in the permanent collections of over 30 museums, nationally and internationally, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Toledo Museum of Art, and in London in the Victoria and Albert Museum and The British Museum. About his work Paley has said "In creating a work of art, besides my personal experience, my concern is how it emotionally and intellectually engages the viewer. Through the creative process I have developed a personal visual vocabulary fundamentally based in symbolism and metaphor which is implicit in my work." I love the whimsical shapes and how colorful it is. When you look at it at a certain angle it reminds me a little bit of Edward Scissor Hands. It's large size and bright colors really make it stand out as you drive by.