EUROPA's newly established Mural Project kicks off with Chris Retsina's cartoon-inspired trompe l'oeil mural that offers a peek into the lives of caricatured New Yorkers, creating a startlingly familiar, multi-layered, and often humorous work that he feels “would make sense in a LES backyard.” Located in the exterior patio of the gallery, Retsina's 20 by 12 foot mural interjects humor into distinct yet parallel stories contained within one building. Inspired by brick facades, and the ever rotating cast of neighbors and eccentric city characters, Retsina has created a heightened version of an essential New York City feeling: we have all snuck a glimpse through open windows at the lives unfolding inside. Depicted within the eight window frames are simple acts of everyday life as well as images of disturbance, drama, and chaos in the household, recreating in the viewer a sense of pleasureful voyeurism and wonder. This surrealist critique of city culture is reminiscent of Retsina's predecessors: Martin Wong, Roger Brown, or Peter Saul. The more one investigates the various scenes that are transpiring simultaneously, the more the work complexifies through key details and signifiers. This is a poignant throughline in Retsina's work, to whom the panels are a form of “domestic surrealism–mundane stuff that becomes weirder upon closer inspection, much like NYC itself.” Chris Retsina b. 1988, lives and works in NYC. Chris has participated in exhibitions in the US and Europe. Recent exhibitions include a two person show with Nick Payne, at East Hampton Shed, 2021, and group exhibitions in Catskill (Nada Foreland), NYC (Alyssa Davis Gallery) Brooklyn (Interstate Projects) East Hampton, NY, (Safe Gallery) and Bari, Italy (Baitball 02)