Why Muralist Eric Junker Paints Walls For Social Causes
Eric Junker is a L.A.-based muralist and lecturer who believes in using art and creativity for good causes. Photo credit: Anise Lew.
L.A.-based artist Eric Junker scouts for an empty wall whenever he needs to blow off steam. He brings with him his paintbrush, a few buckets of paint, and his passion for psychedelic art and chaos.
Something about the thrill of making a huge piece of art in front of an audience has appealed to Junker since the first time he was asked to commission a mural for a restaurant in New York City. (He had never done one before, but he very carefully avoided telling the restaurant that when he signed on to the project.) In the years since that first project, he’s become one of the most creative muralists in the world, using his passion for art to advocate for causes like voting activism, protecting the environment, and homeless youth empowerment.
In 2023, Junker did an artist residency for Artemis Institute, just north of Yellowstone National Park. He was given a tall order: create a street-art language that could communicate the importance of preserving the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, the last intact ecosystem in the lower 48 states. He did it, of course, by combining his love of artwork and nature. In fact, he loved the greater area of Montana so much that he returned to the big sky country with his 15-year-old son the following year to paint more murals… and go fly-fishing, of course.
Here, Junker shares how he works, including why he wakes before his family; stories from his “semi-impoverished career days” when he worked in hidden storefronts and industrial spaces around California; and his idea for an ensemble comedy TV series based on his work in graphic design in Santa Barbara in the 1980s. (Oh, and the exact paint brushes he uses in his line of work!)
During the pandemic, Junker realized how much he loves the social aspect of making artwork. Photo credit: Archer Defterios.
Rise and Shine
Yes, I’m definitely a morning person. I love the tranquility. The stillness. The day ahead as a blank canvas. I get up early, make extra black Italian roast coffee in the French press, catch up on the news (until I start to get angry about the state of the world), then get to work as quickly as possible. When my wife begins to stir, I’ll take a break and make her tea (she’s South African by birth, so loves tea), and find the right tone to cajole my stubborn teenage son out of bed and off to school with a minimum level of conflict. Once the chaos settles, it’s back to work again as quickly as possible.
Work Uniform
I have two pairs of navy blue J.Crew tech pants that are covered with paint. I wear those almost every day. They’re lightweight and easy to move around in, which is especially helpful when painting big walls. I’ll pair the pants with a white Fruit of the Loom crew neck T-shirt, also dappled with paint. All of my clothes seem to have paint on them. When I’m done with work on a wall or in the studio, I’ll swap the Fruit of the Loom T-shirt out for a clean Buck Mason crew neck T. White or indigo. Kind of elevates things. People seem to like the paint-covered pants, so I often leave those on, even when I’m teaching. And yes, I hate shoes. I’m barefoot as much as possible.
Look at those painter’s pants! Photo credit: Adali Schell.
How I Structure My Day
Mornings are for creative work. My prime creative time is from dawn until about 2 p.m., so if it’s a studio or mural painting day, I try to minimize distractions and get the job done early.
Afternoons are reserved for tasks that don’t require firing on all cylinders: a 30-minute nap, ideally some exercise like a long run, returning phone calls. Of course, if I’m teaching, I have to be “on” all day. Coffee will get me through my afternoon slump when I can’t take a nap. I’ll often get a second creative wind around 5 p.m., but that starts to collide with my son coming home from school, my wife finishing her workday, and our dinnertime. We aim for family dinners, where I’m consistently out-cooked by both my better half and my son. After dinner is usually reading, or watching a show. I love competition shows: Top Chef, Project Runway, Survivor. I like to go to bed pretty early. Early to bed. Early to rise.
Playlist Favorites
Most recently while I’m working, I’ve been obsessed with my Latin-inspired Spotify playlists: Grupo Fantasma, Mexican Institute of Sound, Enrique Delgado, and local Los Angeles favorites LA LOM. When I’m driving around the city, I crank up the punk and alt-rock from my youth: X, Minutemen, Meat Puppets, Ramones. On road trips, it’s mostly old-school country and roots Americana: Buck Owens, Willie Nelson, Dwight Yoakam, Lefty Frizzell, Grateful Dead.
Junker scales buildings and create cool stuff at the same time. Image courtesy of Junker.
Tools of the Trade
Tech: Apple MacBook Pro, and Adobe Illustrator is my brain.
Proform 21mm Picasso Stylus Chisel Tip Paint Brushes: Amazing line control, and paint-to-surface delivery. They’re like big-fat Sharpies. Available in 4 sizes.
Nova Color acrylic paint: The absolute best premium acrylic paint at the best price.
Behr Premium Paint from Home Depot: For use when a mural is so big that using Nova Color acrylics would be too expensive.
Grog Squeezer Paint Markers: Makes a super dense graphic line with great drip control.
Railroad chalk: For mapping out murals on walls before painting.
Rolls of Strathmore 400 mixed media paper: I love to draw big. Sketchbooks make me claustrophobic.
Dream Studio
Not the one I have now, which is my garage. Grateful to have it, but not ideal. Believe it or not, there was a magical time in the ’90s in Los Angeles when one could rent super cheap live/work studio space. Ironically, in the earliest semi-impoverished days of my career, I had a couple of fantastic studios that would be my dream studio today. There was a well-lit 2000-square-foot bow-truss and brick industrial space in what is now “the Arts District” that I rented for $650 a month. Sure, there was the occasional dizzying odor of toxic chemicals from the commercial screen-printing shop downstairs, but that was a minor inconvenience. There was a 1000-square-foot 1920s storefront with big bay windows 10 blocks from the beach in Santa Monica that cost me $500 per month. Sure, the living was primitive and probably dangerous with hazardously improvised heating and jury-rigged bathrooms and kitchens, but all that studio space for work and throwing great parties! One can only imagine it today.
One Unique Thing About My Work Process…
I like to use Adobe Illustrator to draw. Not really unusual in and of itself, but I use the touchpad, not a mouse or stylus. It’s like drawing with an old Etch A Sketch. It’s a very clumsy way to draw. I enjoy the subtle lack of control.
Junker in his natural element, painting a bison in the wild. Photo credit: Georgia Junker.
Mantra
Not sure if this has always served me well, but “better done than perfect.”
My Brightest Idea that Never Saw the Light of Day
For years I’ve had an idea for an ensemble comedy TV series based on my first post-college job: working as a graphic designer at an alternative weekly newspaper in Santa Barbara in the mid-1980s. Every week a bunch of laid-back West Coast beach town hippies and carpet-bagging New York East Village intellectuals attempted to work together to put together a local newspaper. It was absurd. The collision of colorful personalities, the late nights, the drugs and sex. The 1980s soundtrack would be epic. Anyone remember the “personal” ads? For those who weren’t there, they were a printed pre-internet version of Tinder or Grindr that could be found discreetly in the back pages of many local weekly newspapers.
To-Do List Item that Keeps Me Up at Night
Oh, the usual things: death and taxes.
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