Miss Birdy: Landscapes of Myth and Memory
Written by Libby Cook
Published on June 8th, 2026
Uptown Manhattan welcomes another Wednesday morning. I turn from the street noise to welcome the ring I’ve eagerly awaited from my phone. On the other end of the line, Mandi Caskey, known professionally as Miss Birdy, greets me with an abundance of cheerful energy. It is impossible not to feel excited to dive into her story.
Thousands of miles away in the Florida sun, Birdy’s unyielding passion shines through the phone.
Thousands of miles away in the Florida sun, Birdy’s unyielding passion shines through the phone. She speaks so freely and enthusiastically as we discuss inspirations, projects, and creative life in small-town USA. Between anecdote exchanges, I can hear the rattle of her spray cans, then the steady whoosh of the paint escaping to the wall. Her focus never breaks. Her expressive storytelling and sharp wit seamlessly carry our conversation as she simultaneously paints her mural, titled Threads of Time, for the Reggae Rise-Up Florida Music and Arts Festival in St. Petersburg. She’s been attending the festival for the last three years. I begin to wonder how she can paint and carry on this in-depth conversation so well, so casually.
A few hours after our call concludes, I open Instagram to check her progress and find myself in awe of a nearly completed wall. I catch myself wondering which parts I audibly witnessed her create through my phone speaker. Perhaps the spindly wisps of graying hair and feathered wrinkles softening an older woman’s face that mirrors her taut past self. Maybe the neon, electric-feeling current tracing the curves of both faces to connect their clear, understanding glances. Maybe Birdy’s own matching neon signature, sealed with a simple heart. Mind-boggling multi-tasking skills aside, Birdy’s talent is undeniable. This Midwestern small-town superstar has forged a space in street art that feels inimitable and permanent.
“I’ve hit a point in life where I realize some things aren’t going to stop,” Birdy says. “I wanted to do a piece that represents this concept of aging and how you’re still all the versions of yourself, past and future. This is my first mural of the year, and I’m really trying to hone in on what I want to talk about.”
Growing up in Lima, Ohio, Birdy inherited her artistic abilities from her grandmother, who primarily did folk painting and signage.
Growing up in Lima, Ohio, Birdy inherited her artistic abilities from her grandmother, who primarily did folk painting and signage. Her parents were equally supportive of her creative interests. They instilled her work ethic early on, encouraging her to be diligent and put all of herself into her projects.
“We were a lower-income family,” Birdy says. “My parents worked really hard, and they just kept telling me, you’re going to make it. My dad was my biggest fan. He always said I was going to be famous one day. I just always held that in my mind. I was very lucky.”
At fifteen, Birdy’s father passed away, and her creative focus shifted to an entirely new intensity. She describes herself going ‘full throttle’ into her art-making as a way to understand her grief. Her high school art teachers took notice and helped her prepare her portfolio application for art school. She was delighted to receive her acceptance to the Columbus College of Art and Design for fine art in 2011.
“I thought, holy shit, I’m going to do this. I’m going to make it out of Lima,” Birdy says. “I’m going to move to Columbus, a much bigger city, and do the damn thing.”
Through numerous creative trials, Birdy’s art persona blossomed in college. She felt uninspired by her rigid fine arts courses, where she repeatedly drew the same still lifes and people. But in one drawing class, her world as an artist opened to a new journey. In the class, she met a boy who asked her on a date to paint an abandoned tunnel. Uncertain of the graffiti world or what she would even paint, she began writing Birdy, a nickname bestowed on her by her friends after finding out she’d been attacked by birds many times as a kid and had a fear of them. Birdy felt there could be more to this creative outlet than just letters. She began researching major artists like Aryz and Herakut and painting large-scale bird murals, which eventually helped her overcome her fear of birds and launched her career focus.
“I realized I could really do [street art] and I dropped out of college,” Birdy says. “The academic world wasn’t the thing to get my blood pumping or what I was gravitating toward. It was the spray paint can in my hand. How could I make that work? That’s the calling.”
Instagram played a crucial role in introducing the world to the Midwestern street art scene. People began posting and traveling to see Birdy’s pieces, and eventually, local businesses took note and began commissioning her for murals. Naturally, the scene began to expand, and Birdy began looking to smaller cities in need of creative community spaces. Local artists wanted to work and learn, but funding was difficult to organize. In response, Birdy and her business partner, Brian Suiter, founded Catalyst Columbus, the city’s first mural foundation.
Birdy and Suiter met in 2017 while speaking on the same panel with city developers about the importance of art and creative space. Their shared passion for community arts led to the foundation’s first grant in early 2020. They’d planned to use the grant for an arts festival, but the pandemic and political tensions at the time pushed them toward local activism. They instead completed a mural across an abandoned overpass in downtown Columbus that read, We are stronger together. The mural sparked more creative projects and helped the foundation find its footing as a facilitator between artists and business owners.
“Getting support is the most challenging thing,” Birdy says. “I think the Midwest cities are starting to understand the importance of street art.”
Birdy has been able to push her creative outreach even further by leading community discussions in small towns that lack access to artistic outlets.
Birdy has been able to push her creative outreach even further by leading community discussions in small towns that lack access to artistic outlets. The goal is always to introduce people to new voices and opportunities they’ve yet to realize within their own world.
“I definitely want to connect and have people see that art-making is a possible career, especially for the kids. It can change their world,” Birdy says. “I didn’t go to my first art museum until I was in college. Having that access is so important.”
At the center of her community outreach mission remains Birdy’s passion and fantasy-inspired work. She’s a self-described sci-fi and fantasy nerd, always dreaming of new worlds and characters. Her favorite movie, The Labyrinth, has been a major source of inspiration for her. She sees herself in the main character, a young girl who navigates a mythical world in search of her missing baby brother, all while grieving the recent loss of her mother. This peculiar world and its characters help her process layers of complicated feelings.
“Fantasies have a way of transmitting emotions,” Birdy says. “Going from painting birds to overcome my fear of them, to now making pieces to process losing my mom last year. I think my work has a way of helping me personally, but I also hope it helps give other people space to experience their emotions in mini worlds.”
These worlds come to life first in Birdy’s sketchbook. Her process begins with the story, a written understanding of the message she wants to convey, accompanied by thumbnails. After the idea is formulated, she gathers reference photos and begins sketching. Birdy’s more personal work primarily resides in her sketchbook, which serves as an expressive outlet during mural season when she feels burned out by commissioned corporate and municipal pieces. She notes most towns and businesses have a say in the themes of the pieces they hire her for, though she has been given more artistic freedom as her career evolves. Today, she’s known for her pieces that playfully capture the local folklore of the communities she’s painting in.
“People see my work and know I’m going to make something relevant to the area,” Birdy says. “I view public art as something I’m doing for the people and their environment. I want to make sure it has a place to live with them.”
The feminine experience also plays a crucial role in Birdy’s inspirations. The majority of her murals feature large-scale women she sees as protectors, playing out the roles in both dark and enlightening historical moments and folklore fantasies.
The feminine experience also plays a crucial role in Birdy’s inspirations. The majority of her murals feature large-scale women she sees as protectors, playing out the roles in both dark and enlightening historical moments and folklore fantasies. For one of her most exhilarating projects, Seeds Sown in Fire, Birdy reached out to the city of Whitehall, Ohio, in 2022 to paint two houses scheduled to be burned in a training fire. The fresh headlines of the overturning of Roe vs. Wade gave the silent, understanding stares of the women she painted a powerful declaration against the flames that ate away at them.
“It was so cathartic, I was so upset at the time,” Birdy says. “It was downpouring but the fire was so hot, you’d immediately get dry. It was so intense. I felt it perfectly captured the feeling at the time.”
Within a Birdy piece, there is always a story to discover that will leave you just as mesmerized as its painted depiction. This novelty has transported her all over the world to paint and create, including a career-highlight mural at Wynwood Walls during Miami Art Week last year. Birdy’s work and personal story quickly captured the attention of curator Jessica Goldman Srebnick. Srebnick could see herself within Birdy’s pieces and connected with her over their shared experiences in losing their fathers. The Wynwood team presented Birdy with the year’s theme, Only Human, which tapped into the unique connections and evolutions between humans and technology, and began helping her prepare to paint a wall. Honesty became the forefront of Birdy’s narrative for her first Art Basel. She knew she wanted her piece to form emotional connections and represent her personal experiences.
“We live in a world where everyone is trying to make the biggest and baddest thing,” Birdy says. “There is a time and place for that, and I love those pieces. But for me, I just wanted to be raw, honest, and thoughtful, and that’s what I brought.”
The piece, titled Bringing the Light Home, was unveiled in December at a packed opening night celebration. The mural features a woman, held in stillness underwater by her own desire to bring the light of a glowing hummingbird cupped in her palms to the skulls and bones of her deceased parents.
“The piece reflects what it feels like to live with grief, how it slows you down, makes everything heavier, but still asks you to keep going,” Birdy explains in an Instagram post.
Surrounded by some of street art’s biggest names, Birdy has cemented herself into the conversation.
Surrounded by some of street art’s biggest names, Birdy has cemented herself into the conversation. People still reach out to her about her Wynwood piece, expressing their admiration and connections to it. Though the noise brings her joy, Birdy is still digesting the effects of such superstardom.
“It was bizarre being on stage with Shepard Fairey at Wynwood; never did I think that would happen in my life,” Birdy says. “People wanting to take photos of your pieces and talk to you about them is a celebration that is really cool, especially when you started doing it in the dirtiest places. I was running from cops so many times, and now I’m here. It’s crazy!”
Looking forward, Birdy is excited for the 2026 mural season. At the end of April, she will be working in the Short North Arts District of Columbus to revive their beloved Mona Lisa mural with her own Birdy flair. Beginning in May, she will travel almost every other week to paint in festivals and shows across the US and Canada. Her journey and projects will be well-documented through her Instagram @miss.birdy and her newsletter, Birds Nest, which can be subscribed to on her website.
Libby Cook is a freelance writer originally from Maine, but currently based in New York City. She enjoys writing features about unique individuals in art and fashion. While attending Ithaca College, where she received her bachelor’s degree in journalism, her feature stories on local artists, designers, and creatives were published in Life in the Finger Lakes magazine and the Ithaca Times. She also developed and solely ran an upstate New York travel blog for LIFL. Outside of writing, Libby works in NYC schools as a youth sports coach and trainer. She specifically loves basketball and still plays in a city league with friends. She also enjoys attending concerts, art shows, and fashion events.
Instagram: @llcook.j
Website: libbycookblog.wordpress.com