Innovative Street Art Cleans Warsaw's Air

In the heart of Warsaw, Poland, stands a building adorned with a gigantic and unique mural. Warsaw joins dozens of cities worldwide in transforming a simple art project into an innovative air purification initiative. This special mural has the capability to clean and purify air pollution through embedded smoke-absorbing pigments. Activated by sunlight, these pigments engage in a chemical process that absorbs pollution and converts it into non-toxic gases.

The project was organized by the sports company Converse as part of a campaign. Organizers claim the mural purifies the air like 720 trees. The aim is to create a network of such murals in several cities worldwide, achieving the cleaning capacity of about 3,000 trees at once.

Featuring images of smiling flowers among tall buildings, the mural was painted on a central building opposite a train station. The Polish artists Maciek and Dawid Ryski designed the characters, while local artists painted them. Among the flowers are the words: "Let's create together for tomorrow," a positive message intended to inspire change and encourage people returning home after periods of isolation due to the pandemic.

A company spokesperson said: "In a time when everything stopped, we saw this as an opportunity to send a positive message and create clean air."

After Bangkok in Thailand, Warsaw represents the second city to complete such a painting. Other cities slated to feature similar murals include Belgrade, Lima, Sydney, Jakarta, Manila, São Paulo, Santiago, Johannesburg, Melbourne, Bogotá, and Panama City.

However, Converse isn't the only company using these special paints for air purification. A Dutch artist named Daan Roosegaarde has released a series of billboards using the exact same paints. Each billboard functions as an air purifier equivalent to 30 trees every six hours and can remain effective for five years. Daan, the mind behind these billboards, is an expert in such projects. For Beijing, he produced the largest air purifier, cleaning 30,000 cubic meters of air per hour, turning pollutants into diamonds through a special compression process.

Not surprisingly, the Dutch artist is an enthusiastic recycler and hopes to make Beijing cleaner.

"Beijing was a great symbol of a bike-friendly, pollution-free city," the artist says. "Together with artists and experts from China and the Netherlands, we will bring back bicycles to be a cultural symbol of China, and this will be the next step toward a smoke-free, pollutant-free city."