Brooklyn-based artists Doug Cunningham and Jason Noto (aka Morning Breath) created the mural above for the 2019 edition of SHINE Mural Festival in St. Pete, Florida.
Below are a few of the references in the mural from the St. Petersburg Arts Alliance website–
At 250 Dr. Martin Luther King Junior Street North, a scattering of images in the style of a “Ripley’s Believe It or Not” ad spreads out on a light blue wall, as if the wall were an old comic book-style pamphlet held out wide.
The design was brush painted, inspired by the business that’s been at this location since 1926 — the Coney Island Sandwich Shop. That business and the artists have roots in New York, so there are subtle nods to the city throughout.
On the left is a large cartoon man’s face tilted slightly, with a garish, wide-open grin. Hair parted in the middle with old-fashioned waves on each side of the temple, arched black eyebrows over wide red eyes. The mad grin is missing a tooth.
This face is the artists’ version of the iconic Coney Island Steeplechase “Funny Face” that welcomed guests from 1908 through 1964. So the family who founded this shop would have seen it, when they visited. Even now, that grinning face appears on shops and merchandise at Coney Island.
Just below the face, the word “Look” in red, with white snow resting on the letters, next to an arrow pointing to the left, that points to a small cut-out in the wall. This was where African Americans would be served if they came to the restaurant in its early days.
To the right of Popeye, in another section of the wall, is a large pair of old-fashioned glasses with angled black frames and red lenses, and wide-open white eyes. The glasses are a tribute to the artist Casey Paquet, who passed away in 2018. Below the glasses, the phrase “Ideas are a Dime a Dozen” is painted above a red hand pointing to the left, and a large hardback book with a black cover. The spine of the book reads “CP 1977 through 2018,” another tribute to Paquet. The front cover spells out “Para CP” vertically, in red, beside a line drawing of a sword swallower, a trick Casey practiced.
In the center of the wall, a huge red hand holds a pamphlet almost as tall as the wall, that reads “Welcome to Fear City,” with a skeleton in a black cowl. This is a reference to a 1970s scaremongering pamphlet called “Fear City: A Survival Guide for Visitors to the City of New York,” published by the New York Council on Public Safety.
You can also find Morning Breath on Instagram. For more on the SHINE murals including the upcoming 2025 festival in November, head here.
