Five Walls in Homs

The murals went up quickly and without permission, on walls that were available rather than suitable. That is the whole method, and it turns out to matter.

A commissioned mural gets a prepared surface, a sealed finish and a wall that somebody has an interest in keeping. These got none of those. What they got instead was the only thing that actually preserves a painting in a city: people deciding it is theirs.

Two of the five have been repainted by people who had nothing to do with the originals — not restored, repainted, in slightly different colours, with the drawing followed carefully and the palette not.

A wall that gets repainted by strangers is doing better than one that is protected.

One has been built over. One has faded to the point where you have to be told where to look, and then it is unmistakable. One is exactly as it was, on a wall that nobody has had any reason to touch, and is somehow the least interesting of the five.