Detroit muralist Jonathan Sandberg has transformed a Pleasant Ridge dispensary wall into a vibrant work of art after winning a community art contest.
The 430-square-foot mural by Sandberg, also known as Seymor, now covers the side of Noxx Cannabis at 23622 Woodward Ave., where thousands of motorists pass daily.
His design, a teal-accented mural featuring a wispy white tree with mist-like roots and glowing square leaves, was selected in May through a public vote after more than a dozen local artists submitted proposals.
“I’ve been painting murals seriously for about seven years, but the last couple years have really picked up,” Sandberg, who lives in Detroit’s Bagley neighborhood, tells Metro Times. “I’ve been painting since I was born, but once I started focusing on these trees, it gave me a little niche to keep pushing and defining my work.”
The piece is part of Sandberg’s signature style of surreal trees with geometric shapes and an ethereal background that blends natural forms with the abstract. Over the past few years, he has refined his theme into what he describes as both a metaphor and meditation – tree leaves that double as neurons and perhaps vessels of a “collective unconscious.”
“All the trees have their own personality,” Sandberg says. “I haven’t figured out if it’s the collective unconscious or the Earth. It kind of gives me liberty to be a little bit more playful.”
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The Noxx contest, hosted in partnership with the Pleasant Ridge Art Council and partially funded by cannabis tax revenue, required artists to use the company’s teal color, avoid cannabis imagery, and create a piece that spoke to Detroit’s character.
Sandberg embraced the restrictions, using black, teal, and grayscale tones to create a layered design centered on a sprawling tree trunk, fog-like textures at its base, and shimmering, square leaves along its branches.
Sandberg worked on the mural over the past three weekends and recently finished it.
The result is a vibrant, whimsical and head-turning mural that brightens up Woodward Avenue.
Sandberg says he was inspired by Detroit street artist Jordan “Tead” Vaughn,” who died in 2017 after falling through a roof while painting a mural. Vaughn was known for his unique, dreamlike bursts of color and hallucinatory landscapes.
“He did these really trippy industrial landscapes,” Sandberg says. “I remember seeing those for the first time, and I always loved graffiti, but it wasn’t necessarily how my brain worked. But seeing how he used spray paint, like my brain works, I decided I’m going to learn this, and I started figuring it out.”
For the first six months or so, Sandberg began experimenting with graffiti, and the results, he says, were some “bad paintings.” But Sandberg persisted and found his style. He’s been painting beautiful murals since.
Tead’s mother Jenny Vaughn encouraged Sandberg to enter the Noxx mural contest. He also served in the Tead One Memorial Artist in Residence Program, a residency program set up in Tead’s honor.
“It really came back full circle,” Sandberg says.
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This article appears in Aug 20 – Sep 2, 2025.
