Awkward and Benjimagnetic have been having a bit of fun in Dean Lane recently, producing a couple of collaborations which are always worth photographing and reporting on.
Benjimagnetic’s GRO letters in the middle of this combination collaboration are book ended by two slightly creepy characters by Awkward. The ensemble works well as always with this pair. It is the eyes in Awkward’s characters that draw me to them, clever and impactful design.
I had only met Esme Lower a couple of times before I met her again while she was painting this piece, and every time she has been ever so friendly and patient with my rambling conversation. She painted this wonderful, piece with a couple of friends on a rather nice sunny afternoon (remember those?), and she has done a really great job.
The piece spells out ‘MELO’ which is the middle section of a conflation of her first and second names. The characterful letters are beautifully decorated with flowers, and the whole piece has a hint of art nouveau style about it. This is a really neat and tidy piece, quite different from a lot of the writing we see in Bristol, which has a strong artistic flair running through it. More to come from Esme Lower.
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Vibrant market town
nestled in the Yorkshire Dales
breathe in the clean air
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by Scooj
This is a pretty difficult damp wall to paint, but that didn’t stop Pura Decadencia and some friends from giving it a go a few weeks back, and because turnover here is very slow, her work is still there to enjoy.
The chrome letters in this piece are accompanied by a red drop shadow and bordered with a thin yellow strip. Each of the letters is split with a red line and little ‘rivets’ either side, giving the look of steel plates hanging together, a device used by quite a lot of writers, and a really effective one. There is a white plasma bolt running through the letters, adding a little bit of extra interest, but not detracting from the big bold letters themselves. Nice work from Pura Decadencia.
Pinning down the names of street artists can be really difficult sometimes. I call Mesk ‘Mesk’, because that is the word he most commonly writes, but his Instagram profile is @lazureness which leaves me with a bit of a dilemma. By which name do I refer to him in my blog posts. I have chosen to use Mesk.
This is a stunner in one of the wall segments at Peel Street Green, which are the perfect dimensions for writers to do their stuff. The letters here are beautifully laid out with an interesting and eye-catching array of colours blending in horizontal strips. These colours contrast neatly with the two-yellows and black lines used on the 3D drop shadow. The writing is set on a pair of blue rectangles, again contrasting with and complementing the letters. A vibrant and enjoyable piece from Mesk, or should that be lazureness?
Doors 323 – Doors of Marrakesh, Morocco, January 2025 (Part IV)
For those of you who have been following this series of doors from Marrakesh, this week’s offering might feel a little bit ‘samey’, as they are more doors from the narrow lanes in the southern end of the Medina in Marrakesh. This whole area is enough to drive a door enthusiast into meltdown. It seems that each and every door is unique and very personal to the dwelling behind it, unlike in the suburbs of British (and other) towns and cities, where uniformity is more the norm.
Most of these doors were all photographed during an early morning walk on my own, which meant I didn’t need to tone down my enthusiasm to appease my wife and daughter, who get a little tired of my incessant fascination with doors. Keywords – Pinky-red walls, carvings, unique. I hope you enjoy them:
So that’s it for another week. If you miss this, it doesn’t really matter, because there is plenty more to come in the coming weeks. My only hope it that it doesn’t get too boring – although things do hot up a bit before too long.
If you have made it this far, you probably like doors, and you really ought to take a look at the No Facilities blog by Dan Anton who has taken over the hosting of Thursday Doors from Norm 2.0 blog. Links to more doorscursions can be found in the comments section of Dan Anton’s weekly Thursday Doors post.
It was a sunny day when I took these pictures, and I’m afraid you are stuck with a rather unattractive shadow, cast in the afternoon sunshine. I’m glad I took the pictures when I did though, because the piece was gone by the next time I visited. This is another in a recent spate of pieces by Cort, and I have to say that he is hitting a rich vein of form, in my view at least.
Cort plays a lot with his writing, both in his choice of his letters and in his unique styling of each one. Here he spells Kortos, a corruption of his usual Cort, and presents each of his asymmetric letters with a different fill that across the whole piece forms a regular Patton or concept. The beautifully painted letters sit on top of a contrasting yellow and turquoise background. Great work from Cort.
This piece is another belter from the recent Bristol Mural Collective paint jam, protesting for peace in Gaza and Palestine. Ailish has painted an abstract piece filled with doodles and symbols surrounding a central phrase ‘this is inhumane’, a sentiment that we all feel but are so powerless to do anything about.
It almost feels trite talking about the artwork when the subject matter is so serious, but it is the artwork and the public nature of it that helps to convey the message and build on support for innocent Palestinians. The patterns and shapes are made up with the colours of the Palestinian flag, as is the centrepiece, creating an overall busy piece wit(a simple strong message. Great work from Ailish.
Asre is back! Back from what or where, I don’t know, but it is great to see his reappearance after an absence of three long years. This piece was tucked away behind the hedge on the swimming pool wall at Dean Lane, a wall that has had quite a high turnover of late and where there always seems to be something new to enjoy.
Unusually, this is a piece of writing from Asre, who is better known for his character faces. Everything is very neat and tidy. Some great colourful fills, clean letters, and two sharp borders, one black and one white. I very much hope that this signals more from Asre – I already have at least one other new piece to share. Welcome back!
I like character artists who create new ideas and scenes, and DFC 1848 has been spending much of the summer introducing us to a raft of fun cartoon animals to enjoy. This humorous piece demonstrates his willingness to look at new things and constantly evolve.
Two dogs need to ‘water’ the fire hydrant. One is freely relieving himself, while the other crosses his legs, waiting for his turn. As a dog owner, this piece appeals to me, although my dog never seems to cross his legs, he’ll just pee on twenty different tufts or objects every time we go on a walk – even if he’s run out, he’ll still squeeze out another drop. Some nice DFC letters and DFC on the hydrant leave us in no doubt about the artist.
Natural adventures 