Hamburg-based street artist Lapiz has brought his sharp wit and political edge to Berlin with a new stencil mural for the Urban Canvas Parkhaus Wedding project, curated by Emily Strange and Liebe zur Kunst. Painted on the concrete wall of a parking garage, the piece shows a sleek modern car towing a rickety wooden cart packed with what appear as indigenous figures, soldiers, riot police, an endangered pink flamingo. It’s a wry take on what Lapiz sees as the illusion of our progress: technology moves forward, but systemic problems like inequality, militarism, and overconsumption keep tagging along.

The artist tells us that the work is partly inspired by an exhibition at the former ethnology museum in Hamburg about the colonial-era extraction of saltpeter in South America. This exploitative practice echoes today’s lithium mining in the name of “green” technology. Lapiz sees this pattern repeating: local environments destroyed, communities displaced, all so consumers in the Global North can feel good and ‘green’ about their electric cars.

Lapiz, who started painting on the streets of Dunedin, New Zealand, has lived and worked in Africa and Argentina. He is known for his colorful, intelligent stencils with a political bite. In an email, he wrote: “I strongly believe that now is the time to raise our voices, now is the time for political action and political art.” With this latest work in Berlin’s Wedding district, he delivers that message clearly—satirical, visual, and timely.

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