STREET NINJA: Owen Dippie in front of his piece Master Renaissance Ninjas, that won top spot in the BSA Most Popular Murals of 2015.PHOTO/ERIN DIPPIE
STREET NINJA: Owen Dippie in front of his piece Master Renaissance Ninjas, that won top spot in the BSA Most Popular Murals of 2015.PHOTO/ERIN DIPPIE
Street art has taken Owen Dippie from Tauranga to the streets of Brooklyn, New York, and has landed him two placings in the prestigious Brooklyn Street Art 15 Most Popular Murals of 2015.
The former Tauranga artist featured two pieces in the countdown, with his Ninja Renaissance Masters landing firstplace.
"I feel very honoured to be categorised among such great artists and a bit overwhelmed that my work took out the top spot," Mr Dippie said.
Ninja Renaissance Masters was inspired by Mr Dippie's childhood love of both Ninja Turtles and Renaissance art, merging the two to create the large mural. His combination of the four Renaissance artists with the 1990s Ninja Turtles was shared 1.1 million times on the Huffington Post Facebook page.
His other piece, The Radiant Madonna came ninth in the list.
Other murals featured in the Top 15 came from places such as Sweden, Norway and Berlin.
Mr Dippie, who moved from Tauranga to Auckland earlier this year, is known for his murals in Tauranga such as the Goldie mural on the side of Broncos Sports in Willow St.
He launched the Larger Than Life project with Creative Tauranga in 2011 and created huge artworks from a range of genres that appear across the city.
Mr Dippie said he would love to paint more art pieces in Tauranga.
"I have a lot of work planned here for next year among other places in New Zealand, I also have some work overseas," Mr Dippie said.
