Walking through Midtown and Downtown Reno, it’s impossible to feel like you’re not being watched. Wall after wall line the streets with eyes keeping watch over the pedestrians passing by. It begs the question, what have the walls seen, and what are the pedestrians seeing?
The murals across Reno are hard to miss and have become a defining feature of the city. Some stretch across entire buildings while others are hiding in alleyways or cover the sides of rundown shops. They’ve become part of how the city presents itself. As Reno continues to change, the difference between murals that feel genuine to the city’s roots and those that feel like decoration is glaringly obvious. Some murals add to the city’s story, while others cover it up.
Midtown has been reshaped in recent years. New restaurants, bars, and apartment buildings fill spaces that not long ago held a different history. The murals have followed closely behind. Some of them give life to the older walls and make sense in their environment. Others look like they were put there to make a decaying building more aesthetically pleasing. There is a sense of forced character.
The murals that feel the most “Reno” to me are the ones that embrace what’s already there. The older pieces with weathered paint, faded colors, and cracks bring an intention that newer murals tend to forget. The old cowboy, whether he’s been there a year or ten, feels settled into the bones of the shop he sits upon. The imperfections of the wall add to the art. The cowboy isn’t trying to hide anything.
Some of the newer murals feel disconnected. They’re colorful and clean, but they don’t tell you anything about the city. It feels like the goal was to create comfort in the creative, rather than reflect Reno and the people who live here. Reno’s murals are a sign of growth and community, not a marketing tool that plays into a new artistic movement. There’s no mistaking a mural made for the community versus one made for social media.
This pattern points to Reno fighting to figure out what it wants to be. There’s a visible tension between the old Reno that people grew up with and the new Reno being built around it. You can see it in the businesses that come and go, the art that covers the walls, and the nostalgia being lost under layers of fresh paint. The walls might be brighter, but they also feel quieter.
A wall tells its own story before a brush ever touches it. When artists work with the flaws and history of a building, the result feels more authentic. When they ignore it and paint over it to make something neat and appealing, it loses the connection that makes art meaningful. Artists owe to Reno’s past to paint stories celebrating what it was and what it’s becoming.
When you walk or drive through mural-filled streets, your eyes are drawn to man made details. This work is not to be taken lightly as it can become a waste to cover walls with art that attempts to shove Reno into a box it doesn’t want to fit into.