Michael's profile

Mr. Michael William Kirby is a leading public artist and street painter from Baltimore, MD, USA. He has nearly 20 years of experience creating permanent and temporary public art pieces around the world and today is considered a leader in this rising art form.
Mr. Kirby's personal technique of using sharp angles and adjusting the image to the viewer?s point of view was adapted from his time while creating sets and props for Opera companies and Movie/TV sets in Italy. Mr. Kirby was one of the first artists to adapt this technique with his own unique style to public art. Using techniques he learned including fresco, he is one of a handful of artists that uses the labor-intensive techniques in the United States. Mr. Kirby has been commissioned and contracted since the early 1990's for his original view of anamorphic or forced perspective street paintings or more commonly known as 3D street art, 3D street painting, 3D chalk art, ephemeral art, or 3D sidewalk art. He also developed original techniques using fiber cement in his work so that his 2D visual public art pieces can be shipped and installed in locations around the world.
Today Michael Kirby is considered a master in the art form and was the first American artist to have won the title of Master Street Painter in all the major European Street Painting festivals. Through his travels creating street paintings, Mr. Kirby has contributed to the spread of the art form to numerous locations that include various parts of Europe, North, Central, and South America, and Asia. The Los Angeles Times wrote, "Michael Kirby is one of the best street painters in the world."
Mr. Kirby has worked for such clients as the Smithsonian Institute in Washington DC, Honda, McDonalds, Carnival Cruise Ships and been featured on the David Letterman Show, Ace of Cakes, BBC, Good Morning America, Il Tempo, Venezia Gazatte, Informador, and others. The majority of his permanent public art pieces are in the Mid Atlantic region of the United States which includes the states of Maryland, Virginia, Delaware, Pennsylvania, and Washington DC.
Mr. Kirby continues to be commissioned and contracted for advertising, marketing, festivals, government agencies, and other events. He has worked in over 200 cities creating street paintings. As well as creating street paintings Mr. Kirby also teaches workshops and lectures on technique and history of street painting. The workshops that teach the tricks of the trade such as using pigments vs pastels, using carpets, scaling, color schemes, mica, and other techniques.

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