Artist: Mister Mural (Derek Wu)(website, Instagram)
Location: 55 Bell Street
Mural Description
Painted during the Belltown Mural Festival 2025.
This mural was partially supported by the Port of Seattle with a loose prompt to reflect, represent, and create an image that was inspired by the working port of Seattle.
Derek has always been interested in the working port: larger-than-life machinery, equipment, and processes that are difficult for most people to comprehend when you talk about shipping and moving large vessels in and out of port.
As a child Derek always imagined the cranes at the port looked like dinosaurs, so he took the whimsical approach to replace the port cranes with dinosaurs, while maintaining the shipping container aesthetic and the port docks themselves, too.
The foreground Brontosaurus rises to about 40 feet tall, matching the height from the fossil record.
The Brontosauruses symbolize Seattle’s longshoreman industry. The Pteranodons on the other part of the wall symbolize the aviation industry of Seattle.
The two murals on this large wall represent the land/sea port operations and the aviation port operations.
Artist Statement
This mural playfully celebrates some of the ways the @portofseattle connects our region to the world.
I’ve always thought Seattle’s ship to shore cranes looked a lot like these giants, so pairing them with stacks of shipping containers were an easy juxtaposition.
Dinosaurs were one of my earliest artistic obsessions and some of the very first things I remember drawing with crayons as a kid. It took a little time, but I finally got the chance to paint them… at full scale.
This was a childish love letter to my home and I’m incredibly grateful to everyone who helped make it happen.
Derek Wu (Mister Mural) bio from Belltown Mural Festival:
Derek is an American muralist born of Filipino and Taiwanese immigrants. As a muralist, signage painter, and youth educator, he has worked to shape the visual aesthetic of Seattle since 2008. Born in Toronto and raised in Atlanta, Derek’s work is rooted in the influences he’s experienced both in the U.S. and abroad. With an imaginative style that feels approachable, his work blends surreal imagery with a sense of place, creating murals that spark curiosity and invite connection.
Map (see murals near me) / Belltown Murals general information