7.5. Upfest 2022 – Page 3 – Natural adventures

4885. Upfest 2022 (60)

Bnie, Vozie, Pekoe and Evey, Upfest 22, Bristol, May 2022

This collaboration is an absolute belter from the RBF crew and brings together the talents of Bnie, Vozie, Pekoe and Evey in one magnificent board.

It was great to watch the crew paint this piece on a gorgeous day in late May, which felt like a genuinely joyous celebration of art and music in a totally Bristol context.

Bnie and Vozie, Upfest 22, Bristol, May 2022

The colour scheme adopted was sustained across the whole collaborative piece and combines the colours pink and blue that seem to have been a bit of a thing this year. On the left, Bnie and Vozie spoilt us with two superb examples of great graffiti writing.

The centrepiece of the collaboration was this magnificent portrait piece by Pekoe and arguably her finest piece of the year, although the bar she set herself was pretty high.

Evey, and Bnie?, Upfest 22, Bristol, May 2022

On the right, Evey rounded the piece off with a huge shout-out to themselves with an RBF which I think might have been painted by Bnie at a guess. Some beautiful work from a beautiful group of people.

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Chi-Yien Snow, Upfest 22, Bristol, May 2022

It never ceases to amaze me just how many artists paint at Upfest, and it is truly a triumph of organisation by Steve and Emma and their team. At the festival, artists can be allocated walls, some of them enormous, temporary hoardings or these 1 meter squares, and it is up to the artists to make the most of the space available. Chi-Yien Snow has done a wonderful job with this board.

Chi-Yien Snow is a fine artist living in Clevedon, who paints in acrylics and oils, and has painted this outstanding and soulful portrait piece for the festival. I would guess that the portrait is of a native South American, perhaps from the Amazon region, or at least that is what it looks like to me. It is always a real pleasure to see the work of new artists and I will be looking out for Chi-Yien Snow’s work from now on.

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Emily Joy Rich, Upfest 22, Bristol, May 2022

Emily Joy Rich is a regular participant at Upfest and her sign writing street art amply demonstrates the breadth of talent on display at the event. I always feel like I have seen more of her art than I actually have, perhaps it is because her pieces are so strong and memorable and remain in the memory for a long while.

This beautiful piece could be adopted as a mantra for our time. For me, I keep on dreaming for an Arsenal triumph in the Premiership, or for a Government free of Tories forever. I love the way Emily Joy Rich has combined the on-point word DREAMING on a backdrop of the words ‘keep on’, written in a drippy handwritten style. This is a classy piece from a classy artist.

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Although I didn’t get a chance to catch up with her, it was a pleasure to watch T-Rex and her Read and Weep (RAW) crewbies (is that a word?) paint a long hoarding wall at Upfest this year.

T-Rex certainly rolled out the red carpet with these two, a dragon and dinosaur, in her beautiful illustration style. I think, and have always thought, that these characters would make excellent material for children’s picture books, although I wouldn’t want too many distractions keeping T-Rex away from her street art work.

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I feel I have been neglecting the remarkable street art work that was created at the end of May during Upfest 2022, such has been the volume of new work in the city, so I am making up for lost time with a quick segment of ten Upfest pieces, starting with this one by Sake One.

This is an absolutely stunning and arresting piece, hidden behind some verdant trees, on a wall that has hosted several wonderful Upfest pieces in the past. I understand that the piece is inspired by the track Paradise Circus by Massive Attack. The California-based artist, who is no stranger to Upfest, said of this piece

“Since many apple trees are covering the wall, I wanted to make it appear like they are forest nymphs peering through. I thought it would work to give the mural this title, since she has a devilish grin. I also wanted to give a wink or Easter egg to Massive Attack and Bristol”

This is a fine work from a celebrated artist, and it was great to welcome him back to Bristol again for the festival.

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Vanessa Scott, Upfest 22, Bristol, May 2022

I don’t recall ever going to this car park and finding it without a car parked in front of this long wall. Having said that, it is not a car park that I often frequent, and maybe I have simply been unlucky on each visit.

The long mural is by Vanessa Scott, who painted a memorable piece for Upfest in 2021 as part of the 75 walls in 75 days event, and it was great to be able to welcome her back this year with this calming water lilies piece.

The abstract design is perfect for this wall and rather grey car park environment, bringing a spot of colour and uplifting beauty to the streets. Vanessa Scott comes from Manchester and is a prolific muralist, whose work we don’t get to see too often here in the south.

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This wall is a powerful and significant wall, reasonably new to Upfest, that although is impressive, is really difficult to photograph. Because it is high up, the bright sky behind it tends to lead to underexposure of the artwork, so I have to do a little bit of post-production work just to make these pictures reasonable.

The mural is by Snub23, a regular at Upfest, and one who pretty much always gets to paint one of the premium walls. Snub23’s work these days usually features comic book-style characters, caught in a narrative and almost as if they were ripped out of the pages and stuck up on the wall. What is the rest of the story behind this magnificent piece?

Technically, this piece is beautifully painted, with fabulous detail in the character’s mask and in the material around his neck. The background is a perfect, patterned backdrop for the scene, providing an almost pixelated or white noise environment, which is very effective. This is a great Upfest piece from Snub23.

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There are some paintings at Upfest that you fall in love with at first sight and this magnificent mural by Sphiza is exactly that. From the moment I first saw it, I knew it was something rather special.

In this piece, which makes extraordinary use of colours to create shadings and texture (a bit like a stencil might), Sphiza conveys an important ‘peace’ message via a portrait of a youngster drawing a peace symbol on a sheet of paper. I don’t know very much about Sphiza, and haven’t seen any of her work before, but am especially interested because she is from Porto in Portugal, and regulars will know how much I love the city.

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At last year’s Upfest, Cuicasolo was given a lovely wall in the Hen and Chicken café garden, this year she had to make do with one of the square boards, which she has painted expertly.

Cuicasolo’s designs are nicely thought out and have a mixture of geometric discipline and abstract freedom, creating work that dances in front of your eyes. The colour selections work well together and the overall piece is pleasing, it is a pity she wasn’t allocated a wall to paint this year, but with so many artists, a large proportion of them end up painting boards,

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In one of the prettiest backwaters immediately off North Street is the perfect street art wall. This miniature park, ‘Ebenezer Pocket Park’, has benefitted from some stunning murals over the years, and at Upfest 22 it was the turn of Philth.

Philth is perhaps best known for his floral designs, one of which can still be seen in North Street Green, not far away from this piece. In this outstanding mural, which has a retro feel to it, Philth has painted a beautiful young lady in amongst an ocean of mushrooms and fungi. The ribs under the caps have been cleverly observed and recreated. What makes the piece special is the green tones that have been used and the splashes of red, lifting the whole design to another level. A truly wonderful Upfest piece.

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	paulh121 on 7360. St Werburghs tunnel…
	paulh121 on 14 years
	hitandrun1964 on 7360. St Werburghs tunnel…
	beth on 14 years
	hitandrun1964 on 14 years

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