A Dominican Artist Painted What’s Now the Tallest Mural in the U.S.
What organizers call the tallest mural in the United States now runs up a 29-story NYCHA tower in the South Bronx, a portrait of the families who live there painted by Dominican artist Néstor Omar García, known as Angurria. “Un MAR de Gente / From Every Shore” climbs more than 307 feet up one face of Morrisania Air Rights, or MAR, a public housing complex, according to 6sqft, and it was unveiled at a launch event on Oct. 27, the Bronx Times reported.
Angurria, an award-winning muralist known for his focus on Dominican identity, created the piece with his studio, Monumental.do, and Bronx native Fernando Orti. “I grew up in Los Alcarrizos painting the people of my neighborhood, and in the South Bronx I found the same pride, the same strength, the same families,” Angurria said. “For decades, the city has driven past these towers without really seeing who lives inside.”
The Hair Rollers on the Mural Go Back to His Mother’s Salon
The mural depicts residents of the development across generations. Across its three sections, a grandmother in hair rollers cradles a baby, people from different cultures appear side by side, and two kids play by a fire hydrant.
Angurria traces the rollers, a signature of his work, to childhood memories of the women at his mother’s salon in the Dominican Republic, and he named his recurring character, Doña Patria, after his mother.
What’s more, the mural celebrates the growth and diversity of a diaspora that has grown by 58% over 14 years. According to a new analysis of United Nations data, of every 100 Dominicans who joined the diaspora since 2010, 83 chose the United States. New York City has long been one of the biggest concentrations of Dominicans.
Residents Helped Choose the Details, Even the Scrunchies
ArtBridge, the public art nonprofit that commissioned the mural, held community workshops with residents over roughly five months in 2026 alongside Angurria, Ortiz, and Tanya Pedler, president of the MAR Resident Association. Residents learned how a mural is made and were asked how they wanted to appear in it.
“We decided on things collaboratively, from the scrunchies to the T-shirts and shoes,” ArtBridge program director Jon Souza told PIX11.
A Muslim girl from the neighborhood told Pedler she hoped to see a woman in a hijab, which she wears herself, and one appears in the finished piece. Similarly, a child in earmuffs at the top of the mural nods to neighbors with special needs, the Bronx Times reported. “Two key core concepts that were part of this mural were diversity and inclusion. So we wanted to reflect the diversity of the community, but we also wanted to ensure that it was inclusive,” Ortiz said.
Ortiz, a Dominican American who grew up in the Bronx and founded FOGA, had already led community engagement on the “WE ARE THE BRONX” murals for the Third Avenue Business Improvement District.
“When we began, we hoped to create the tallest mural in The Bronx. Then we learned it would be the tallest in New York City. Now, we’re celebrating the tallest mural in the United States,” Pedler said, according to the Bronx Times.
Organizers Say the Tallest Mural in America Belongs in Public Housing
Morrisania Air Rights dates to 1980 and sits on air rights above the Metro-North tracks, and its three towers house about 1,950 people. Because the mural is painted on the building’s exterior, at 3145 Park Avenue near East 158th Street, seeing it requires no ticket.
“The tallest mural in the United States isn’t on a skyscraper in Midtown Manhattan and no longer on the walls of a luxury building in Downtown Miami—it’s now in public housing in the South Bronx, and that’s exactly where it belongs,” Alex Zablocki, executive director of the Public Housing Community Fund, said, according to The Source.
The M·A·C VIVA GLAM Fund gave ArtBridge a $165,000 grant for the artwork and the community engagement behind it. And the Public Housing Community Fund also supported the project, the Bronx Times reported. “Our communities are often overlooked, and there’s been less investment in their housing. So while we work on improving their housing, we’re also wanting to make sure that it’s a place that’s beautiful, that residents love, that they’re proud to come back to,” Dylan Baker-Rice, NYCHA’s chief asset and capital management officer, said, according to the Bronx Times.
“On behalf of the entire Morrisania Air Rights community, we are thrilled to showcase this incredible masterpiece,” MAR resident Carmen Capone said.
Bronx Leaders Used the Unveiling to Make a Case for Arts Funding
Deputy Mayor for Housing and Planning Leila Bozorg, Bronx Borough President Vanessa Gibson, State Sen. José Serrano, Assemblymember Chantel Jackson, City Councilmember Althea Stevens, and NYCHA CEO Lisa Bova-Hiatt were among the officials at the unveiling. Local leaders who spoke there, including Rep. Ritchie Torres, pressed the case for arts and community funding across the borough.
“Oftentimes, when budgets are facing fiscal challenges, fiscal constraints, it’s usually the arts and education and the cultural programming that gets cut,” Gibson told the Bronx Times.
“When I go back to D.C., I’m gonna ask my colleagues, ‘Do you know where the tallest mural is located?’ And I’m going to tell them it’s exactly where it belongs, in the Boogie Down Bronx,” Torres said.
“I think it’s fitting that we have the largest mural in America, and that it happens to be the most beautiful mural in America, because it tells a story,” Serrano said.
“The residents of MAR gave us their stories, and in them, every family in the Bronx can recognize its own. Now the whole Bronx can look up and see itself,” Angurria said.