Coming soonThe cover and more about For Example are coming soon. The very first signed and numbered copies will be available on all three nights of Strange Bird.
From the other side of the court the wall is still small. A strip of pink and yellow at the end of a green field, under a sky just turning light, with cactuses along the fence. You have to know where to look to see that something has begun here.
This photo of For the Love of God, the mural by Francis Sling at Landhuis Rondeklip, Curaçao, was taken on 23 August 2024 at twenty to seven in the morning. Eighteen days after the first layer of blue, about a third was done.
The figure of 35% came from Francis himself. On his old website he kept track of the wall like this, like someone on a journey reading the signs along the road.
For the Love of God at sunrise, about a third done, at the far end of the sports court at Rondeklip.
The only photo in the series Francis took of himself. Two fingers up, the lens so wide the court curves, and behind him the wall that now runs all the way round. This is how someone looks when he knows it is going to work.
On 7 March 2025 For the Love of God, the mural by Francis Sling at Landhuis Rondeklip, Curaçao, stood at 70%. At 35% it was August 2024; more than six months lie between these two photos. The first third went fast; what came after took time. The scaffolding is still up.
Francis Sling (Curaçao, 1979) is a painter, muralist, poet and musician. You can tell from this photo: he does not only make the work, he also reports on it.
Francis Sling takes a selfie at 70%: For the Love of God now runs all the way around the court.
Just after half past ten at night, the tennis court lamps on, and not a single flower on the wall yet. The branches are there, though: long, winding lines over a first layer of pale blue. The skeleton of the work stands before anything grows on it.
This is For the Love of God on 5 August 2024, the mural by Francis Sling at Landhuis Rondeklip, Curaçao, at the very beginning. The scaffolding waits on the right. Evenings on the island are cooler.
The branches you see here seem to follow the same path in the finished wall. Everything that came after hangs from them.
The first layer of blue on For the Love of God, at night under the lamps of the sports court at Rondeklip.
Look at the bottom, not the top. Among all the flowers stands an ordinary chair with paint pots in front of it. That is where the work happened. The wall is so full you almost forget: this was made by hand, by someone who now and then had to sit down.
Yellow, red and pink, packed so tightly that the branches nearly disappear. This part of For the Love of God, the mural by Francis Sling at Landhuis Rondeklip, Curaçao, was photographed on 13 February 2025, late in the afternoon.
Francis Sling is a painter, muralist, poet and musician, and he has painted many walls on Curaçao before. But this full, you rarely see: a wall that looks as if it started blooming by itself.
Up close: the flowers of For the Love of God, with a chair and paint pots below.
The green is gone. The tennis court from the beginning has been painted blue, so blue that the floor becomes part of the wall. Where there was once a sports court with a painting around it, there is now one space: you do not stand in front of the work, you stand inside it.
For the Love of God is the mural by Francis Sling around the sports court at Landhuis Rondeklip, Curaçao: flowers, hummingbirds and branches along the full length of the wall, and red metal branches reaching above it against the sky. On his old website this photo was called "The story in short".
At the end of November 2026 this court is the setting for Strange Bird, the launch of his new book For Example. Then this empty court gets its audience.
For the Love of God, Francis Sling's mural around the blue court at Landhuis Rondeklip, Curaçao.
Not open yet. That is the beauty of this photo: the flamboyant is about to bloom, and the wall has yet to begin. Both are still in bud.
The flamboyant, flamboyan in Papiamentu, flowers bright red in summer on Curaçao. Francis Sling photographed this bud in July 2024, a few weeks before he put the first layer of blue on the wall of For the Love of God at Landhuis Rondeklip. The flower returns in the mural.
On his old website this photo sat above the section he called "thoughts". Perhaps because a bud is exactly that: something already there, but not yet visible.
A bud of the flamboyant tree, one of the flowers that return in For the Love of God.
Look at the shadow first. On the left, on the blue court, stands a second Francis with the same open arms, pressed flat against the wall he painted himself. The maker and what he leaves behind, in a single frame.
This is not the pose of someone who has finished. It is the gesture of someone giving something back. For the Love of God began as a commission ("it was supposed to be a job") and grew into the largest work Francis Sling has made so far: a mural wrapped around a sports court at Landhuis Rondeklip, about the moment love created everything. A rainbow-coloured branch winds in from the left and seems to end right at his hand. Above it, metal leaves in pink, yellow and orange catch the light.
Francis Sling (Curaçao, 1979) is a painter, muralist, poet and musician. His walls in Willemstad, such as 3 O'Clock Romance in Scharloo and Djosa in Otrobanda, have become landmarks on the island. Djosa asks what God is. For the Love of God paints one possible answer: love, as the beginning of everything.
At the end of November 2026 this wall is the setting for Strange Bird, the launch of his new book For Example. Whoever comes will stand on the same blue court as Francis does here.
Francis Sling, arms open, before For the Love of God, his largest mural, at Landhuis Rondeklip, Curaçao.
An artist holding his book in front of his face: it is almost a title in itself. Of Francis Sling you only see the beret and the hands. He leaves the rest to the book.
For Example is his new book, full of art, sketches, words and ideas. The open pages show what it is made of: popcorn clouds in black and white, stars and typewritten text. The popcorn is not a joke. Francis says that, wearing the best glasses in the world, he sees a universe of examples, like popcorn popping open: each one unique, yet part of one big story. It is no accident the book is called For Example.
Blue tape runs over the spine, the same tape that holds every sheet of paper to the wall in his studio. On this website too: every work hangs with a strip of blue tape. The book opens the door to his studio, and this site is that studio.
The very first signed and numbered copies are on sale at the end of November 2026 at Strange Bird, the book's launch at Landhuis Rondeklip, with this wall as its setting.
Francis Sling disappears behind his new book For Example, blue tape over its spine, in front of his mural on Curaçao.
You hold a book like this when you never want to let go of it. Arms crossed over it, head tipped back, the laugh wide open.
Behind Francis Sling runs the great branch of For the Love of God, the mural he worked on for two years. Against his chest he holds For Example, the book that grew in the same studio. Two works meeting here: the wall will be the setting where the book is launched.
That happens at Strange Bird, at the end of November 2026 at Landhuis Rondeklip: a theatrical evening with dinner and a show on Friday 27 November, and art, music and discovery on Saturday 28 November. The book is on sale on every evening, including the very first signed and numbered copies.
Anyone who wants to find Francis afterwards will find his work at the Artcave Gallery on Bargestraat in Scharloo, Willemstad, and his walls all over the island.
Francis Sling laughs, his new book For Example held to his chest, in front of For the Love of God at Landhuis Rondeklip, Curaçao.
The lens bends the wall into a wave that seems to break over Francis. That is truer than you might think: For the Love of God is not a straight wall, but one that runs around an entire sports court. Whoever stands in the middle is surrounded by it.
Only someone with the hard work behind him can lean back this easily. In August 2024 Francis Sling put the first layer of blue and the lines of the branches on the wall at night, under the lamps. A few weeks later, at sunrise, about a third was done. By March 2025 the painting ran all the way around the court, and then came the layers: paint on paint, until it has relief. On the wall About Francis in the Bubble that whole series hangs together, from the empty wall to this photo.
Beside him a flamingo flies, the pink bird you see standing in the salt pans of Curaçao. On this wall it does not stand still, it flies.
Francis Sling leans against his mural For the Love of God, by the flamingo, at Landhuis Rondeklip, Curaçao.
He is not looking into the camera but up, at the leaves. It is how someone stands who is still amazed by what he made himself.
Only in this photo do you see how big For the Love of God is. The wall runs all the way around the court, and Francis Sling is a small figure in front of it, in a white shirt against the blue. Behind him the great branch winds through the frame from left to right, past pink flowers and hummingbirds. Even the basketball hoop has been taken into the painting: the sports court was not painted away, it is part of the work.
Above it, metal leaves in pink, yellow and orange reach out against the sky. They turn a flat wall into a space: whoever stands on the court stands under a canopy.
For the Love of God is about the moment love created everything. That Francis painted it on a sports court, a place where people gather to play, makes it a wall to stand inside, not just to look at.
Francis Sling, small before the whole of his mural For the Love of God, around the sports court at Landhuis Rondeklip, Curaçao.
You look through the fence, like someone who does not belong. The sun rises behind the bushes, and at the bottom of the frame, behind the wire, lies the wall full of flowers. This is how you see the work here: from the outside, as if you were coming across it for the first time.
"It was supposed to be a job": that is the title of the story on his old website that goes with this photo. For the Love of God, his mural around the sports court at Landhuis Rondeklip, Curaçao, began as a commission. Somewhere along the way it became something else. "It chose me, honestly," he also wrote, "one of the most meaningful works I've ever created."
The photo is from 10 February 2025, just after seven in the morning. From commission to creation to offering: that is what he called the story on his old website.
"It was supposed to be a job." Francis Sling's For the Love of God began as a commission and became an offering.
You cannot see this in any photo of the whole wall. Only when your nose is right up against it do you notice that the paint does not lie flat: it stands up, in edges and ridges, layer over layer. The wall has a skin.
For the Love of God, the mural by Francis Sling at Landhuis Rondeklip, Curaçao, is a painting from afar and almost a sculpture up close. This photo was taken on 28 May 2025.
On his old website this detail, together with two others, stood for the three evenings then provisionally planned for April 2026. The detail shows why you need to see a work like this in person: a photo is flat, the wall is not.
From very close: the paint on For the Love of God lies in layers, with relief.
Before there was a wall, there was a table. A cup of coffee, markers, a few sheets with flowers and leaves in blue and yellow, and beside them the real flowers of the flamboyant tree, still fresh. What went on the wall first lay on the table.
This is the earliest photo in the series of For the Love of God, the mural Francis Sling made from 2024 to 2026 at Landhuis Rondeklip, Curaçao. On his old website this photo opened the section about the poem and the music that belong to the work.
Put the finished wall beside these sketches and you see how much of the paper survived: the same flowers, only many times bigger.
The first sketches for For the Love of God, with real flamboyant flowers beside the paper.
Two branches that will not let go of each other. They twist around one another from left to right, through the flowers, and just where you think they will part, they swing back. It looks less like a tree than like two people.
For the Love of God, the mural by Francis Sling at Landhuis Rondeklip, Curaçao, is about the moment love created everything. If there is one place on the wall where you see that theme almost literally, it is here.
And above it, the basketball board simply stays. Francis let the sports court remain a sports court. The love in this work is not in a church or a museum, but in a place where people come together to play.
Two branches twisting around each other in For the Love of God, under the basketball board of the old sports court.
A place nobody looks at twice. A faded tennis court, a basketball board on the back wall, a stripe of green paint that gave up long ago. Every mural starts like this: as a wall you do not see.
On this wall Francis Sling painted For the Love of God from 2024 to 2026, his largest mural so far, around the sports court at Landhuis Rondeklip, Curaçao. The work is about the moment love created everything, and so it begins here, with almost nothing.
Look at the basketball board. It was never taken down. On the finished wall it is still there, right in the middle of the flowers.
How For the Love of God began: an empty wall beside an old sports court at Landhuis Rondeklip, Curaçao.
No flower left to recognise, no branch. Only red, orange and yellow crashing into each other, with cool blue in between, and beneath them the ridges of the paint. If the wall is about the moment love created everything, this part looks like that moment itself: heat and light, before there are shapes.
This detail of For the Love of God, the mural by Francis Sling at Landhuis Rondeklip, Curaçao, was photographed on 28 May 2025.
Francis says that, wearing the best glasses in the world, he sees a universe of examples, like popcorn popping open: each one unique, yet part of one big story. In this photo you see what that popping open might look like. The same idea runs through his new book, For Example.
Red, orange and yellow with blue in between: a detail of For the Love of God that looks like fire.
On the left everything is white, on the right it burns. It looks as if you are standing on the border between a part of the wall that has yet to begin and a part already in bloom, but the white is not emptiness: these are leaves and shapes pressed into the wall, visible only because the light casts shadows into them.
This detail of For the Love of God, the mural by Francis Sling at Landhuis Rondeklip, Curaçao, was photographed on 28 May 2025. On his old website it sat above the section about the artwork itself.
You could read it as the whole work in miniature: first the shape, then the colour. Just as it began with lines on blue, and only later with flowers.
White relief beside bright colour in For the Love of God: shapes that come out of the wall.
The mural is finished, and it is the setting of Strange Bird: the launch of Francis's new book For Example at Landhuis Rondeklip. Thursday 26 November 2026 by invitation only; Friday 27 November dinner and show; Saturday 28 November art, music and discovery. Tickets via OTRA Tickets.
“One of the most meaningful works I've ever created. It chose me. And I know it's not something I want to do alone.”
Coming soonThe cover and more about For Example are coming soon. The very first signed and numbered copies will be available on all three nights of Strange Bird.
Tickets for
Strange Bird
27 and 28 November
Landhuis Rondeklip
Strange Bird, the launch of For Example at Landhuis Rondeklip. Friday 27 November: Dress-up Evening. Saturday 28 November: two sessions, at 6 PM and 7:30 PM.
Saturday 28 November
Art, Music & Discovery
6 or 7:30 PM
Three one-hour sessions; the first is the Family Show. XCG 25 early bird (until 12 November), then XCG 35. Children aged 12 and under go free (with their own free ticket and an adult), at the Family Show only. The grounds open at 5:00 PM.
“Everyone is a little bit in love with Francis Sling, and luckily there is enough Francis for all of us.”
— Tania Kross
Tania Kross and Francis Sling are both from Curaçao and went to the same primary school. In this episode of A Kross … Francis takes her inside his head, and into the book that is growing out of it: For Example.
The book began as half-thoughts he jotted down; some of them turned into chapters by themselves, such as Place Before Words, about the place where you already know something before you have the words for it. The title says what it is about: we live in examples. We follow them, we try to be one, and we make metaphors and poems about them, but the example is never the thing itself.
Francis is making the book as a work of art: black and white, with only the tape in blue, and with the scratches and the things that didn’t work out still in it. It comes in a box, with a deck of cards to bring your questions to and an eraser that is also a fridge magnet: a reminder to draw without chasing perfection.
They talk about doubt and about AI, which first made him angry and then made him ask what he is, then. His answer: what makes you you, empathy, and being human. “There is nothing wrong with being wrong and not everything is right about being right.”
At his mural For the Love of God he tells the story of two gods who meet, and of a man and a woman who dance together without melting into one. His message: we are all makers. Tania ends by calling him “an artist, a questioner and above all a beautiful person”.
A Kross … is Tania Kross’s podcast about people who dare to dream beyond the horizon.
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