{"id":208814,"date":"2026-03-07T09:49:10","date_gmt":"2026-03-07T09:49:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/208814\/"},"modified":"2026-03-07T09:49:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-07T09:49:10","slug":"bay-area-mural-artist-bringing-nature-to-barren-walls-nbc-bay-area","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/208814\/","title":{"rendered":"Bay Area mural artist bringing nature to barren walls \u2013 NBC Bay Area"},"content":{"rendered":"

Across a busy street from where dozens of skateboarders flipped, skidded and careened at a San Francisco skate park, Amanda Lynn was making big art.<\/p>\n

The noted Bay Area muralist was removing graffiti and freshening up a massive mural she\u2019d painted years back that wrapped around the wall of an electronics store, blossoming with bright colors, flowers and animals that evoked the escape of nature into a hardscrabble concrete intersection.<\/p>\n

\u201cCreating moments of joy for people is so powerful,\u201d Lynn said.<\/p>\n

Wearing black jeans that showed as much paint as the walls, Lynn fielded a steady stream of accolades from neighbors and passersby who stopped to thank her for the infusion of painted nature.<\/p>\n

Over the past couple of decades, Lynn\u2019s art has transformed many walls across the Bay Area and San Francisco into similarly colorful scenes \u2013 flowers adorn a Target store wall on Geary Street, an intricately painted woman\u2019s face stares out from a restaurant on Larkin and Sutter, butterflies, plants and another face occupy the alley of 111 Minna Art Gallery. She has left her colorful painted mark all across the city.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been told that I tattoo walls,\u201d she said, her own tattoos peaking out from her shirt sleeves.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Mural<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\tJoe Rosato Jr.\/NBC Bay AreaJoe Rosato Jr.\/NBC Bay Area<\/p>\n

Mural artist Amanda Lynn touches up one of her murals in San Francisco\u2019s SoMa District.<\/p>\n

In her hometown of Forestville, a suite of Lynn\u2019s nature-based murals greet visitors as they enter the Sonoma County town. They cover a nightclub, a store, a long wall and a children\u2019s park.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel nature is a universal connector of all,\u201d Lynn said. \u201cEverybody can identify with nature, even if you\u2019re from a city. Everybody knows what a weed looks like.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lynn\u2019s life was formed in nature, specifically in the woods of western Pennsylvania. Her foray into mural painting came at the age of 16 and was actually intended as a punishment. She was behind the wheel with her mother in the car when she got popped with a speeding ticket for going way too fast. As atonement, her mom required her to paint flowers in the hallway of the family home.<\/p>\n

\u201cI fell in love with it and my punishment ended up being my career,\u201d Lynn said.<\/p>\n

She moved to San Francisco and fell in with graffiti artists who taught her another important life lesson: learn to paint for the love of it, not just the money. She took the lesson to heart but still turned it into a career. While the graffiti painters employed aerosol cans to make their art, Lynn painted her murals with old school brushes.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy brushes never let me down,\u201d she said grinning. \u201cA brush never gets clogged.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lynn loved the frenetic energy of San Francisco\u2019s streets, the paradox of bringing beauty to walls within the concrete jungle. She imbued the woods and creatures of her childhood on the walls of the city \u2014 bright green hues serving a startling discovery as people rounded the corners of the Mission District or Tenderloin.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Mural<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\tJoe Rosato Jr.\/NBC Bay AreaJoe Rosato Jr.\/NBC Bay Area<\/p>\n

Mural artist Amanda Lynn touches up one of her murals in San Francisco\u2019s SoMa District.<\/p>\n

She saw murals as a piece of public art anyone could enjoy without buying a ticket or having to gain access.<\/p>\n

\u201cPublic mural art and public art in general speaks to me because it\u2019s art for everyone and it really connects with people in their own place and own time,” Lynn said.<\/p>\n

Lynn\u2019s career was reaching new heights when three years ago it all came crashing down. She fell off a scaffolding while painting a mural, plunging 16 feet. She broke her pelvis in 15 places and cracked a couple ribs. As she slowly healed, she required physical therapy to learn to walk again, and the pain was a constant. But somewhere within the experience, she became thankful for the crash and its unexpected lessons.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had just this outpouring of generosity and love that even to this day chokes me up,\u201d she said. \u201cIt also just showed me how much people actually care about what I do and me as a person.\u201d<\/p>\n

After she healed, she went right back and finished the mural. The experience though, taught her she wasn\u2019t invincible. Since then she takes more care on ladders and focuses on projects that bring her joy.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Mural<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\tJoe Rosato Jr.\/NBC Bay AreaJoe Rosato Jr.\/NBC Bay Area<\/p>\n

Mural artist Amanda Lynn touches up one of her murals in San Francisco\u2019s SoMa District.<\/p>\n

She\u2019s recently noticed more women getting into mural painting, where she was often the only one. The new generations of street artists give her hope.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s become such a more accepting environment for younger girls to be out and starting,\u201d Lynn said. \u201cThere\u2019s many generations below me now that are doing such incredible things.\u201d<\/p>\n

Back in her hometown of Forestville, Lynn stood on a mechanical lift painting a wall for a homeowner. The base color was cloaked in her signature neon green along with vines, flowers and forest creatures. She descended the lift and stood back to admire the bare green wall, folding her tattooed arms to gauge her progress and perhaps ponder possibility. She was in her happy place \u2014 surrounded by forest, conjuring another one on a previously unremarkable blank wall.<\/p>\n

\u201cNature just speaks to me,\u201d Lynn said, admiring her enormous canvas. \u201cSo I kind of get a vision.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Across a busy street from where dozens of skateboarders flipped, skidded and careened at a San Francisco skate…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":208815,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[15519,101,103,102,104,106,105,96224],"class_list":{"0":"post-208814","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-francisco","8":"tag-art-and-culture","9":"tag-san-francisco","10":"tag-san-francisco-headlines","11":"tag-san-francisco-news","12":"tag-sf","13":"tag-sf-headlines","14":"tag-sf-news","15":"tag-womens-history"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208814","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=208814"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208814\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/208815"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=208814"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=208814"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=208814"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}