ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED SEP 2023 — UPDATED MAY 2026
"Lost Time" mural known as the Mona Lisa of Williamsburg, Brooklyn, New York – bCLPhoto
The Mona Lisa of Williamsburg — A Wall Worth Getting Lost For
The best things I've found in New York I've found by accident. No map, no plan — just walking, which is how I prefer to explore any city I don't know well. An August morning in Williamsburg, the heat already serious by ten o'clock, the streets quiet in that particular way that New York gets in summer when half the city seems to have slowed to a different pace. I was going nowhere in particular.
And then I turned a corner and stopped.
Full view of the Lost Time mural, Williamsburg, Brooklyn – bCLPhoto
The Wall
The mural covers the entire side of a five-storey building — the kind of blank brick wall that, without the painting, would be exactly that: blank, functional, invisible. With it, the building becomes something people cross the street to look at. A woman, rendered at impossible scale, her head resting in her hands, looking out at the street with an expression that is hard to name. Thoughtful. Patient. Slightly amused, perhaps. She's wearing a striped jumper. She looks like someone you might know.
The nickname writes itself: a woman's face, contemplative, chin resting on her hands, painted at monumental scale on a wall in Brooklyn — New York's answer, someone decided, to the lady in the Louvre.
The pose is what gets you first — so simple, so human, so completely unexpected at that scale. And then the execution: the detail in the face, the hands, the way the figure fills the wall without overwhelming it. I've seen large murals that feel like they're shouting. This one feels like it's thinking.
I spent about fifteen minutes there, which is a long time to stand on a pavement in August heat. I went close and pulled back, shot from one side and then the other, tried to find the frame that captured both the scale of the thing and the intimacy of the face. It's not easy — at full building height, you can't get both in the same shot without making compromises. I made them. I kept shooting.
Detail of the Lost Time mural by Colossal Media, Williamsburg – bCLPhoto
Lost Time
The mural is titled Lost Time and was painted by the New York-based street art studio Colossal Media, known for their hand-painted large-format works across the city. It sits at the corner of a residential block in Williamsburg, Brooklyn — a neighbourhood that has spent the last two decades cycling between gritty and gentrified, and which still manages, on a quiet August morning, to feel like a place where people actually live. The walls of Williamsburg have long been a canvas — if you want to explore more street art and graffiti photography from New York and beyond, take a look at the Graffiti & Street Art gallery.
The Williamsburg Bridge is nearby, visible from certain angles as you walk away from the mural. That combination — the bridge, the brownstones, the painted woman five storeys tall — is one of those New York moments that doesn't need any filter or framing to look like a photograph.
Worth the Detour
I don't say this about many specific spots: this one is worth going out of your way for. Not just if you're a photographer — though if you are, bring a wide-angle and plan to spend some time — but for anyone walking through Brooklyn with an hour to spare. The mural won't always be there. Street art is ephemeral, as I've said before. Go while it is.
Finding it
The mural is in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, near the corner of Broadway and South 6th Street, a few steps from the Williamsburg Bridge. The nearest subway is the J/M/Z line to Marcy Avenue, or the L train to Bedford Avenue — from either stop it's a short walk. Go in the morning if you can, before the light gets harsh and the street gets busy. Open in Google Maps →
New York in summer has its own rhythm — if you've ever caught the 4th of July Fireworks in New York, you'll know exactly what I mean.
"Lost Time" mural, the Mona Lisa of Williamsburg, Brooklyn, New York – bCLPhoto
Williamsburg rewards a slow walk — the murals change with the seasons. For more Brooklyn street photography, Brooklyn Unfiltered: A Street Photography Walk covers the neighbourhood from Carroll Gardens to the Williamsburg Bridge.
A short walk south-east, Lee Avenue shows a completely different side of Williamsburg.
For more public art photography, Madrid Street Photography starts at a mural in Lavapiés and ends at the Plaza Mayor.
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See more street photography in the portfolio.
Cosme Lapena is a Barcelona-based street and urban photographer and founder of bCLPhoto.
Exhibited at espai [b] since 2010 · Published in The Eye of Photography and 35mmc. Browse the portfolio or read more on the blog.
