Laguna Beach Wyland Whaling Wall 12

History of the Laguna Beach Wyland Whaling Wall 12

-Laguna Coast

“Laguna Coast”was painted in 1987 on the side of the former Wyland studio gallery in Laguna Beach. The twenty-foot-high mural of a spy-hopping California gray whale remains today, replaced with a tile replica of the original image. It bids a fitting farewell to the thousands of people traveling along Laguna Canyon Road on their way out of town.

“I wanted to give every visitor a lasting impression about the Laguna coast and its fantastic marine life, including whales and the many different kinds of birds,” Wyland says. “The wall is painted in such a way that you can’t ignore it.

As for “politics and red tape,” the likes of which Wyland experienced the first time he painted a wall in Laguna Beach, there weren’t any this time. In fact, instead of controversy, the artist was greeted with a resounding proclamation from the city. “I think the city realized the effect these murals were having on the community” he said

• Once a sleepy arts community, by the 1980s, the city of Laguna Beach was experiencing the same environmental shifts as other California Coastal communities, with the push for more intensive growth and development that threatened to put more pressure on regional marine life and coastal habitats.
• When the mural was tiled several years later, new regulations like the California Coastal Act were being implemented, signaling the importance of saving the state’s fragile coastal resources.

Whaling wall 12

2171 Laguna Canyon Road, Laguna Beach, California
20 Feet Long x 24 Feet High
Dedicated February 2, 1987
By Darlene Wyland, Artist’s Mother
Tiled in 1996

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