Category: 5. Street Art

56. Jubilee Street (1)

This mural rather dates itself with its portrayal of the obsession of the selfie. I guess it is called ‘I’m taking a selfie’. It is one of several works in the immediate vicinity that have the ASK signature on it.

ASK collaboration, Jubilee Street, Bristol, October 2015
ASK collaboration, Jubilee Street, Bristol, October 2015

OK, so I am new to all of this, but it took me quite a while to find out who or what ASK is. It turns out that ASK is a Bristol crew, the acronym stands for After School Klub. As far as I can work out, there are four members of the ASK crew, and they are Epok, Sokem, 3Dom and Sepr. I am not sure which of them is behind this particular work, which is perplexing.

ASK collaboration, Jubilee Street, Bristol, October 2015
ASK collaboration, Jubilee Street, Bristol, October 2015

In addition to ASK, some of their individual or collaborative works are tagged with ASK KTF or ASKTF. The KTF is another TLA (Three Letter Acronym) which I understand to be ‘Keeping Things Fresh’. I will feature more of their works soon.

UPDATE June 2016 – There are at least 14 or so members of ASK, but I still don’t know which members are responsible for this piece.

55. Gloucester Road, Co-operative

I had originally thought that this was an advertising piece, because it is so well proportioned and executed. Of course I was wrong, and have grown fond of the ‘So far so good’ mural by Akarat and Hoax.

Hoax and Akarat, Gloucester Road, Bristol, October 2015
Hoax and Akarat, Gloucester Road, Bristol, October 2015

Akarat is another Bristol street artist who has emerged from the hip hop and reggae scene. His works usually have some kind of social commentary to them. His favoured techniques would appear to be similar to those used by Nick Walker; stencils and sprays, freehand and rollers. He often collaborates with Hoax another Bristol artist who also enjoys making political statements. I’m not sure why, but Hoax’s signature has been painted over since this was completed.

7/10

54. Midland Street (1)

While shopping today in an old Bristol department store, Gardiner Haskins, in an area I don’t often visit, I discovered a whole area of street art that I haven’t seen before. So many murals.

Sepr, Midland Street, Bristol, October 2015
Sepr, Midland Street, Bristol, October 2015

I love this Sepr mural ‘no petting’ it is quirky and humorous. He is incredibly prolific in Bristol, and I am pleased to have found this work. More from this area to follow.

Sepr, Midland Street, Bristol, October 2015
Sepr, Midland Street, Bristol, October 2015

8/10

53. Nelson Street hoarding (1)

There is a lot of building work going on in the old centre of town, mostly the construction of accommodation blocks for students. Of course this means that there is a fair amount of permitted street art space on the hoardings around the sites.

Andy Council, Nelson Street, Bristol, October 2015
Andy Council, Nelson Street, Bristol, October 2015

Andy Council is an artist who lives in Bristol. His works usually incorporate dinosaurs or other animals and architecture, and much of it is about Bristol. You can see his work all over the place, frequently in community spaces that need brightening up. He is also the ‘go to’ designer for all sorts of leaflets and other communications material.

Andy Council, Nelson Street, Bristol, October 2015
Andy Council, Nelson Street, Bristol, October 2015

This work painted in 2014 is a typical piece. It is temporary and likely to be gone soon.

 

52. Broad Street

During the ‘See no Evil’ event in Bristol in 2012, Conor Harrington dropped over from his native Ireland and painted this mural in his distinctive style. It is called ‘the Duel of Bristol’.

Conor Harrington, Broad Street, Bristol, October 2015
Conor Harrington, Broad Street, Bristol, October 2015

Harrington now lives in and has a studio in East London. Like so many before him, he started off as a graffiti artist, but is now a celebrated muralist gaining worldwide acclaim. There is more about him in this excellent Frankie Beane post.

Conor Harrington, Broad Street, Bristol, October 2015
Conor Harrington, Broad Street, Bristol, October 2015

This mural happens to be located in one of my favourite parts of Bristol, tucked away behind the church of St John the Baptist and through the old city gate – I love the way it is framed by an ancient/modern setting.

Conor Harrington, Broad Street, Bristol, October 2015
Conor Harrington, Broad Street, Bristol, October 2015

8/10

51. Frogmore Street (3)

Standing on the bridge at the bottom of Park Street looking North East, you are treated to the most wonderful stencil by Banksy.

Banksy, Frogmore Street, Bristol
Banksy, Frogmore Street, Bristol

‘Man hanging’ which probably goes by several different names was sprayed in 2006, and led to something of a watershed in a permissive stance from the Bristol City Council regarding what was then called graffiti. There is a lovely article written at the time from the BBC website. How things have come on in relatively few years.

Banksy, Frogmore Street, from Park Street, Bristol
Banksy, Frogmore Street, from Park Street, Bristol

I am fortunate enough to walk past this iconic Banksy twice a day at least, and I am never bored by it. In 2009 the work was attacked with blue paint, calling into question all sorts of difficult conversations about street art and graffiti and vandalism and ‘he had it coming to him for selling out’ etc etc. For me it is just a pity. It seems that with his art, if you are not there in the first day or two, it will get damaged or removed.

Banksy, man hanging
Banksy, man hanging

9.5/10

50. Culver Street

It is only right to mark my 50th street art post with my favourite stencil artist. JPS, an adopted son of Bristol is from nearby Weston-super-Mare, where several of his works adorn the holiday town streets.

JPS, Culver Street, Bristol, September 2015
JPS, Culver Street, Bristol, September 2015

This incredibly detailed stencil, ‘Spartacus’ is a tribute to the Welsh actor Andy Whitfield who played the star role in the Starz TV production of Spartacus. He died in 2011 aged 39 of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

JPS, Culver Street, Bristol, September 2015
JPS, Culver Street, Bristol, September 2015

I was lucky enough to photograph this work a day or two after it was completed on 13 April 2015. It is the detail of the clothing and belt that I think marks out JPS as an incredible talent.

JPS, Culver Street, Bristol, September 2015
JPS, Culver Street, Bristol, September 2015

The ‘Spartacus’, on the wall of the Queen Shilling night club, is only yards away from another JPS I posted on 8 July 2015.

9/10

49. Hepburn Road

In September I took this picture of a mural by Cheo. There are a couple of things worth pointing out. The first is that he has not included one of his signature bees – perhaps not cool enough for the subject material.

Cheo, Hepburn Road, Bristol
Cheo, Hepburn Road, Bristol

Secondly, this picture does not look like a commission and is in an area where there is a lot of ‘permissive’ and ‘illegal’ art. I would always put Cheo into the former of these two categories.

7/10

48. Charlotte Street, above Vincenzo’s

This mural by Nick Walker probably gets more exposure than most in Bristol, simply by virtue of being visible from Park Street and it’s incredibly high retail foot-fall. However, I am not sure many people register it because, in my experience, most people don’t look up, especially when they are shopping.

Nick Walker, Charlotte Street, Bristol, April 2015
Nick Walker, Charlotte Street, Bristol, April 2015

This work is rather corny if you ask me, a bit of a schoolboy joke, but it does show Nick Walker’s range.

Nick Walker, Charlotte Street, Bristol, April 2015
Nick Walker, Charlotte Street, Bristol, April 2015

 

 

47. Hillgrove Street (3)

I have refrained from publishing this picture for a while because I have been trying to find out who the artist is. The mural can be seen in a second story window frame opposite the wave and flegm mural featured a while back.

Dan, Hillgrove Street, Bristol, September 2015
Dan, Hillgrove Street, Bristol, September 2015

The witty picture looks rather old and appears to pre-date quite a lot of the other works in the area. I really should be able to find out who painted it, because it is signed, either MN or MAN. If anyone knows, please let me know and I will update this post. (UPDATE, The mural is by Dan)

Dan, Hillgrove Street, Bristol, September 2015
Dan, Hillgrove Street, Bristol, September 2015