Unknown Artist Creates Sidewalk Portraits in Downtown Kalamazoo

Beautiful drawings of local buildings are, mysteriously, popping up in downtown Kalamazoo.

This morning, I was casually browsing the posts under Kalamazoo's Reddit thread when I came across this:

The original poster said they had stumbled upon this drawing on the sidewalk a couple of months ago but had no idea who did it. The comments were slightly helpful with Reddit user sgw97 writing,

I walked past the person who was drawing this while they were working on it few months ago - they used crayons instead of chalk which I think is why it's lasted so long (it's still there as of yesterday!)

That was just three days ago (9/21).

I thought the picture was gorgeous and the fact that it was done on sidewalk with crayon blew my mind. I mentally gave a nod to whoever the mystery artist was and moved along.

Get our free mobile app

However, I came across another post from a different Reddit user sharing a picture of a piece of sidewalk art that looked very familiar in style:

It seems that downtown Kalamazoo is host to a very talented artist who seems to remain unknown.

In the comments of the secondary Reddit post a user by the name of Prior_Dragonfly7982 said:

This is the work of Danny Staggs, artist and tattooist. He’s been doing these all over Kalamazoo.

I, quickly, did a search for Danny Staggs on social media. I did find a Facebook page and Instagram page that describe him as a range of things from a musician to a father to a tattoo artist. I found no evidence that Danny is the mysterious sidewalk artist in downtown Kalamazoo but, if there was ever a person who could figure out how to make art out of crayons on a sidewalk...it would be a tattoo artist.

Danny, if you are the one creating this beautiful works of art on the sidewalks of downtown Kalamazoo, thank you. Stumbling upon a random work of art always makes my day better. And while I can't speak for anyone else judging by the posts in Reddit, people are impressed with your work.

Next time you find yourself strolling down the streets of downtown Kalamazoo keep an eye out. You never know where the next piece of art may pop up.