ARTEL Brings Together Community At the Second Annual Williamsburg Mural Festival
Written by T.K. Mills
Photos Provided by Kimberly Kevorkian & ARTEL
Published on August 7th, 2026
On a sunny summer weekend this past July, the annual Williamsburg Mural Festival returned for its second edition, featuring music, murals, and good vibes. The festival was hosted and presented by ARTELFEST in partnership with North Brooklyn Open Streets. Held at the Bedford Slip, a public plaza near one of North Brooklyn’s busiest pedestrian intersections, the festival demonstrated what can happen when space usually reserved for vehicles is returned to people.
On the artistic front, the festival was curated by Calicho, with a line up featuring: Jason Naylor, Majo San & Felipe Umbral, Isabelle Ewing, Dasha Bough, Manuel ‘The Creator’ Alejandro, Clove Flores, and Joe ‘ManintheBox’ Caito with music hosted by Thomas Indilla and a series of guests DJ’s he selected.
ARTEL, which is an acronym for ‘Art Everyone Loves’ was founded by Rich Ramsay in 2022, with the purpose of creating a haven and inclusive community where artists of all types and backgrounds can connect, collaborate, and flourish. Over the past few years, they’ve produced dozens of events in both NYC and abroad (several of which UP Magazine has covered.) With the Williamsburg Mural Festival, it is their third time partnering with North Brooklyn Open Streets, with previous events hosted in nearby McCarren Park.
Explaining the philosophy behind the nascent annual festival, Ramsay explained, “Watching artists transform incredible spaces and seeing thousands of people connect through creativity reminds me why I started creating festivals in the first place. I founded ARTELFEST with a vision to build a growing portfolio of festivals that celebrate artists, activate communities, and transform public spaces through creativity.”
The founder continued, “The Williamsburg Mural Festival is the first mural festival created under the ARTELFEST brand and represents the beginning of a larger vision. We are committed to continuing to build, invest, and expand this festival while developing more unique cultural experiences that bring people together. Our goal is to establish Williamsburg Mural Festival as a true New York City staple and continue growing ARTELFEST into a leading platform for public art and community-driven festivals around the world.”
“It isn’t about the money,” Ramsay said. “It was just bringing people together. It’s really for the artists. Rent keeps on going up in Williamsburg… and we’ve got to keep something for the artists.”
The Bedford Slip rests on the border of Williamsburg and Greenpoint and has been a focal point for NBOS, given its high foot traffic. Kevin LaCherra, a Greenpoint native and strong advocate for pedestrian spaces expounded on why events like the Williamsburg Festival are important.
“We need to make public spaces that people can enjoy, where kids can safely ride a bike or do art,” LaCherra said. “The mission is, in addition to telling, to show. To say, ‘This is what this space could be.’” Alongside the muralists, a mutual-aid table distributed free children’s books that was manned by LeCherra and his fellow volunteers as families and residents walked through admiring the art and examining the books. Gesturing to the event, he added, “Normally, it’s just a left-hand turn onto Manhattan Avenue. But you look at it today, and it’s really something to see.”
While most of ARTEL’s events host an open-call, for the mural festival Ramsay instead tapped Calicho to curate the festival, whose own mural experience and knowledge of the NYC-art community allowed him to put together a strong line-up in short time. Comparing the roster to a soup filled with distinct ingredients, in which each artist brought a separate flavor, but everything still belonged together.
“I didn’t want to put chains or restrictions on the artists,” he said. “Paint something that you feel connected to, something that you feel comfortable painting.” Calicho continued, ““Every single artist is painting something completely different from the other, it’s just beautiful.”
Given freedom, synchronicities still developed amongst the exhibition, with several artists inclined toward portraits. Manuel Alejandro painted a tribute to musician Oliver Tree, who died in a helicopter collision in Rio de Janeiro on June 14, 2026. As a fan, Alejandro approached the portrait as both live painting and memorial.
“I’m having a great time doing a portrait of Oliver Tree,” he said. “All the other artists are doing different subjects. I like that there is no theme. They’re doing what they know how to do best and killing it.”
Nearby, Jason Naylor used the word HUMAN as the foundation for his piece, placing the letters inside the silhouette of a head. Known for his bright and colorful lettering, Naylor wanted to remain connected to his visual identity while trying something that felt new.
“Sometimes I’m like, ‘I don’t want to do words because I always do words,’” he said. “But I had this idea, so it’ll feel fresh for me but still within my style.” With artificial intelligence reshaping conversations about labor, authorship and creativity, the insistence on humanity felt especially timely. Naylor described himself as being in a “rage against the machine” state of mind, using the mural to accentuate the message.
Isabelle Ewing also chose to put a spin on her usual repertoire, painting her friend Sage, a New York fire performer who works with House of Yes. Ewing based the piece on an image of Sage blowing fire from her mouth.
“I’ve been painting people from my mind for quite a while, and now I’m pivoting to painting friends,” Ewing said. “I love the fire element and wanted to bring that into today’s block party.”
Taking inspiration from fellow female creatives motivated Clove Flores as well, who arrived at the festival without a clear concept of what to paint. She has only been officially living in the city for a few months, though her past visits to NYC have helped her establish connections with the local art scene. Seeking to pay tribute to that spirit of community, she looked to neighboring muralist Dasha Bough as a muse.
“I wanted to honor one of the artists here,” she explained. “That speaks to the nature of street art culture—we reference, but also honor and take care of us. We all come up together… The street art scene is incredible because it’s all about relationships,” she said. “You make friends here, they bring you here, they bring you there.”
For Dasha Bough, the festival marked her first mural. Accustomed to sculpture, oil painting, charcoal, animation, film, fashion and other media, Bao arrived with charcoal and pastels rather than relying entirely on spray paint. “I’ve never done a mural before, but I love working large,” she said.
Her composition featured two sisters from the Republic of Icaria, a narrative she’s been developing that is set in a near-future dystopian part of Central Asia that connects Bao’s many creative disciplines. The characters appear throughout her paintings, sculptures, animations and silk fashion work, turning each medium into another entry point into the same imagined universe. Approaching her first mural, she was pleasantly surprised to find the community more supportive than anticipated.
“People grow off each other’s energy,” she said. “It’s not the competitive environment that I expected.”
Joe Cato, also known as Man in the Box, is also newer to the mural game, having only started a year and a half ago, though in that time he’s completed a dozen or so pieces. For the Williamsburg Mural festival, he painted a tattooed China-doll figure designed to be visually playful. As with Dasha, he found the experience welcoming.
“This is my dream,” he said. “I never thought I’d be doing something like this, ever. I’m honestly grateful to be here and connect with the community.”
Collaborators Majo San and Felipe Umbral created a symbolically layered mural. Their surreal landscape incorporated a snake, an egg, vegetation, a sword and a sphere. The piece developed through conversation, with each artist proposing separate elements before finding a shared composition. For Majo, the egg became a cosmic form. For Umbral, the relationship between the snake and egg suggested death, rebirth and transformation.
“It’s about change,” Umbral said. “All of that which makes us become who we really want to be.” The sphere represented what Umbral described as a perfect human state: a continuous form without an obvious beginning or end, embodying the seemingly limitless quality of the spirit.
Their decision to participate also reflected a less visible challenge in artists’ lives—the difficulty of finding time to create without turning that creation into another obligation. Majo arrived feeling under the weather, with other projects still demanding attention. She and Umbral briefly considered staying home to work. Then they reconsidered.
“This is our time to have fun and to share it with the community—with our artist friends,” Majo said. “We have to dedicate this time.” She credited ARTEL with providing the context that made such a day possible: the location, materials, audience and gathering of peers.
“As artists, this is our duty,” she said. “To give back like that.”
Beyond muralists, other artists were involved as well. Zara Cimone had originally met Ramsay through his gallery space, and when he launched ARTEL she joined the team. While holding down the supply table, she worked on her own canvas, capturing the surrounding environment and the festival as it unfolded. In between distributing materials and answering questions for visitors, she worked on her piece.
“We’ve got all the paint here,” Cimone said. “People just come in, hang out, paint, listen to music and see all the great artists.”
Her description distilled the festival down its essential element: making art approachable. The festival creates opportunities for artists, but it also argues for their continued presence within Williamsburg. At a time when cultural identity is often used to market neighborhoods long after the artists who created that identity have been displaced, ARTEL insists that creative communities must be actively supported. The same mantra is what drives organizations like the North Brooklyn Open Space initiative to create environments for residents to enjoy the city.
“As long as the artists keep making art, we’re always going to be here,” Ramsay said.
Or as Calicho put it, “We are in the heart of Brooklyn… To feel summer in New York—the DJ, food in the streets, people walking by—there is nothing more beautiful for a street artist than remembering that day you were painting in Brooklyn with the community.”
T.K. Mills is the Editor-in-Chief of UP Magazine, a street art publication based in New York City. After receiving a Master’s Degree in Global Affairs, he discovered a love for graffiti while backpacking through Cuba and pursued life as a writer. Outside of UP, T.K. enjoys writing poetry, personal travel essays, and occasionally short stories. His work has been published in The Smart Set, The Vignette Review, Genre Urban Arts, and Eternal Remedy among others. Beyond art, T.K. loves reading and traveling.
Insta: @t.k.m85
Website: www.tkmills.com