Fil-Canadian muralist Sowl makes his mark in Eastwood City
When you find yourself in the Megaworld Township of Eastwood City, walking by the Eastwood LeGrand Tower, do yourself a favor and look up. On one of its walls is a six story-high mural by Filipino-Canadian multidisciplinary artist Sowl. Entitled Mac & Qi’s, the strikingly colorful artwork looks almost out-of-place in Eastwood’s urban jungle. But the longer you look, the more you realize it’s exactly where it should be.
See, when Sowl creates his hip hop-flavored art—paintings, sculptures, tattoos, and murals spread across Asia and the Americas—he leaves a bit of magic in each piece. It’s supposed to heal and revive weary souls, including his own. His mural in Eastwood City radiates the same kind of spirit, touching its city-bound viewers.
“It’s meant to uplift and spark something within—an energy that pushes you forward in your everyday life,” Sowl tells PhilSTAR L!fe. “This mural isn’t just mine. It’s for everyone walking their own path to power and peace.”
This level of empathy can only come from a deep relationship with self-doubt. As Sowl digs himself out of that black hole with each artwork he creates, he gives everyone around him a boost, too.
From dark to light
Born and raised in Toronto, Canada, 32-year-old Sowl’s creativity saved him from boredom many times as a kid. At seven years old, he picked up a pencil because he couldn’t have the toys he wanted.
“I found the ultimate toy in a pencil,” he says. “I wanted a Power Ranger or Voltes V. I couldn’t get those, but I could draw them. So I thought, ‘I can get anything through my pencil.’ The universe helped me through my pencil. It’s really a life hack.”
From pencils, Sowl’s tools eventually included charcoal, markers, spray cans, and paint brushes. Today, he combines all these disciplines whenever the piece calls for it.
His purpose in making art has also evolved. If, as a child, he drew to entertain himself, as an adult, Sowl began using art to create transformative experiences for himself and for anyone else looking at his pieces.
In fact, his name comes from one such cathartic moment. Years ago, finding himself in an intense depression, Sowl stumbled upon something unexpected.
“I’ve been trained to hate myself. I don’t know who did that to me. In my depression, I went above the clouds and saw my inner child crying, uncared for,” he says. “I asked him, ‘What’s your name?’ He said, ‘Sowl.’ I told him, ‘You know what, I love you and all your flaws.’ I acknowledged his existence and found love. That’s when Sowl was born.”
Cultural identity
Sowl’s art is influenced by an amalgamation of cultures. He lives, after all, in one of the most multicultural cities in the world.
But a near constant in Sowl’s pieces are elements of Filipino culture. This artist, who cooks excellent sinigang, is drawn to Philippine indigenous textiles and baybayin.
“I can’t read baybayin, though. That’s why I abstracted it so I can read it,” Sowl says. He does something similar to the fabric he sees in Philippine markets. “I told the vendors, ‘I can’t buy your textile, but I can draw them.’”
Fascinated by all the cultures around him, Sowl largely kept his own story within the characters he created in comic books. Eventually, he realized that it was his narrative that he should have been expressing more in his work. Each piece, therefore, is a documentation of Sowl’s life. Ask him what he was going through as he created every piece of art, and he can tell you all the details just based on what he made.
Like many art forms, Sowl’s murals and paintings are products of spontaneity.
“I just let my inner child run,” he says. “As blank as the wall is, that’s how blank my mind is when I start [working]. Then I have a conversation with myself. And then the wall deciphers my thoughts—‘What am I going through? What am I dealing with?’”
The courage to create
It takes Sowl 50 or so hours to complete his Eastwood City mural Mac & Qi’s. Every day for over a week, he puts on his painted salakot, straps himself to a harness on a red boom, rises six floors up, and gets to work.
“I’m scared of heights,” he says as he signals to the boom operator to raise the lift. “I also have a phobia of jewelry,” Sowl adds as the boom stops halfway up the mural, right by a spray-painted string of pearls.
Courage comes in many forms. For Sowl, his bravery manifests through the personal journey he takes every time he picks up a paintbrush or a can of spray paint. He looks his fears straight in the eye and calls their bluff.
“My mural is a visual story of overcoming—the journey of the self rising above any force that stands in the way of our greatness,” Sowl says. “I know others are going through their own battles, too, so this mural is a reminder: You’re not alone.”
Connect with Sowl at artofsowl@gmail.com and on Instagram at @sunfloweramen.
