Like many Polish cities wishing to shake off the lingering greyness left behind by communism and its lacklustre “one million and one” blocks of flats, Poznań has taken to professional street art with great enthusiasm. The local scene took off in 2011 with the first edition of the Outer Spaces Festival, which saw renowned muralists from Italy, The Netherlands, Spain, and France invited to spice up the drab exteriors of five carefully-chosen buildings. The project was a hit, and a second edition was organised a year later, adding a pop of optimism to Wilda, Poznań’s supremely grey, impoverished district once deemed “Satan's lair” in a Pidżama Porno song called Ezoteryczny Poznań (“Esoteric Poznań”). The third (and, sadly, last) edition put the spotlight on Jeżyce, the increasingly hipster district west of the centre.
More recent additions to Poznań's large-scale art include a sprinkling of poems by Polish greats Zbigniew Herbert, Tadeusz Różewicz, Wisława Szymborska, and Stanisław Barańczak, the splendid 'Śródka Tale' mural, and a 2017 work by Italian artist Maupal, portraying a woman attempting to sew together two parts of the Polish flag.
