LOCATION: COTTAGE STREET > EAST KINNEY STREET

The work features consistent motifs of complex, colorful backgrounds made from fractured polygon patterns. A series of prominent figures anchor the mural, which creates a mystical focus. Figures and backdrops are painted with an empathetic realism but posed with some symbolic gesture or object that includes an homage to immigration, agriculture, housing, meditation, or colonialism.

Assisted by Ralph Osorio

Decertor (Daniel Cortez) is from Lima, Peru. He is a painter interested in building weatherproof memories in public spaces. He began his career with no formal studies in art, and his first inspiration came from portraits of the common man and woman that make up the human scenery of the Peruvian cities. His style started with the exercise of realism but then developed to emphasize the interconnectivity between the individual and the community in the social psyche. As an active street painter, he was part of the Hip Hop movement in Lima, always involving his work on social issues. This contributed to finding their way on muralism, risking new formats, and reinterpreting pre-Hispanic iconography in his style.

Currently, Decertor feeds on the social context and the architectural sites that he chooses to do his work, always seeking for an active confrontation of the mural with the viewers. He believes that street painting is an effective tool to bring social and global issues to the fore. He strives to perform his work by decentralizing and democratizing the walls, which transforms them and elicits their humanity. Thinking of the arts as an excuse to continue painting, his work has transcended his hometown borders and can be found in cities such as Cartagena in Colombia, Cochabamba in Bolivia, Mexico City in Mexico, Buenos Aires in Argentina, Azemmour in Morocco, among others.

This is his first mural in Newark, New Jersey.

Instagram: @decertor