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On the road again
a slow train to Manchester
for one night only
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by Scooj
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On the road again
a slow train to Manchester
for one night only
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by Scooj

Although he only paints occasionally, Serm always leaves a good impression. This is a nice large piece of graffiti writing on the long wall at Peel Street Green. One of the interesting features of this wall is that it is broken down into about eight equal sized sections, each one just the right size (actually on the slightly large size) for an individual to showcase their work. Each ‘frame’ is rarely dogged, and some pieces can remain here for quite a while.

Serm writes with large chunky letters and a deep 3D drop shadow, in this case in lilac/purple shades that contrast with the green/yellows in the letter fills. There is a certain amount of panache about his work, and it is a genuine pity that he doesn’t manage to get out and paint more often.

This wall is adjacent to a shop called Veeez, a name that might be familiar to regular readers of Natural Adventures, because of its close association with street art in Bristol and Weston-super-Mare. Every now and again the wall is handed over to a street artist who may be holding an exhibition of art in the shop, and I think that is the case with this brilliant piece by Peanutsdeli.

The artist’s style is without doubt influenced by manga comics – my first introduction to which was the fabulous TV cartoon series Marine Boy in the 1960s. This bright and colourful piece acted as a prelude to the magnificent clothes and prints that were inside the shop. I am a huge admirer of Peanutsdeli’s work and am overjoyed every time he paints in Bristol.

I am so pleased that Donz is starting to get more of a presence on Natural Adventures, an unfortunate underrepresentation which is an artefact of the fact that I don’t visit L Dub all that often, and Donz rarely paints anywhere else in Bristol.

This is a fun piece in a typically wacky style from Donz made all the more fun by the inclusion of a character face replacing the ‘O’ in his letters. It is a fact of life in street art writing, that the letter ‘O’ more than any other can be fiddled around with and replaced, for example Biers and his WD40 and Boogie with his double ‘O’s. There is some nice lettering here that bleeds away at the top.
Either Donz needs to come into the centre more often, or I need to get out to L Dub, but until one or both of those things happen, Donz will most likely only make occasional appearances in these pages.

I am very short of time today, with lots to do, having spent the whole of yesterday in London at a wonderful wedding of a cousin of mine. Still feeling a little worse for wear, and tired, as we were on the last train out of London, and then had to endure music and a party in our next door neighbour’s flat which continued until 4am. A little bit of Mr Klue magic is the perfect antidote to this.

Mr Klue has been a little quiet over the winter, but seems to be cranking things up a little. This piece is in one of his favoured spots, and is probably one of his clearest renditions of the letters KLUE in his ephemeral abstract style. A perfect piece for a Sunday morning.

Sometimes you just can’t see the wood for the trees. I don’t understand how I missed this wonderful piece by Cheo, both on social media and in situ. I am guessing that it is a Halloween piece, or at least it looks that way (Fact check: it was painted around mid-October for Halloween), and got lucky, because it was painted over a few days after I took these pictures. Even though I think I have my eyes open, I still manage to miss things.

There is some real depth to this piece, which looks more like a painting than a piece of street art. I think it was painted at ground level and then placed in this elevated spot outside The North Street Standard with the help of Upfest. All the ingredients for a Halloween piece are there, a cat, a pumpkin, a cauldron, some wispy ghosts, a witch and a skull and bones, all given the special Cheo treatment. A lovely piece.

It feels like Raid has been really upping his game lately, both in frequency of painting and in the quality of his work. When I first saw this piece, I said “oh yes!” under my breath, knowing that I was looking at a really classy piece of writing that has come about through hard graft and honing of skills. Watching Raid’s development is a joy and a pleasure.

It is impossible to ignore the brilliant fill pattern, which although quite simple in concept is beautifully executed and really effective… it has the ‘wow’ factor. The letters RAID are in a rotationally symmetrical form, a form that Raid has used several times before. An outstanding piece of graffiti writing.
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Sweet sibilant song
a robin busting a lung
pauses for replies
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by Scooj

Aah! what joy finding this outstanding piece by Sepr and Boaster the day before going away for a week on holiday. Finding this piece, in part, helped me to overcome any withdrawal symptoms or FOMO while I was skiing in the French Alps. If I had missed the piece, I would have been a little regretful. but thankfully that didn’t happen.

It is possible to see when artists are having fun and obviously bouncing with shared ideas and inspiration. A pair of toucans drinking Carlsberg Special Brew… who’d have thought it? The toucan on the left was painted by Sepr with all his trademark stylised cartoon painting skills on show. I cannot explain how much I like this piece, and have missed his work, which seems to be occasional these days. The toucan is holding a plastic bag containing four beer cans and he is holding another in his other hand. The piece is accompanied with the words “Two can Jackie Chan the toucan with a bag o’cans!” pretty much describes the piece. Jackie Chan is offering a can to his friend to the right.

I recently posted a piece by Boaster which I photographed in Nottingham, so it is really satisfying to see another one so soon and this time in my home town of Bristol. Boaster’s toucan is drinking a bottle of Brahma beer (a brand I am not familiar with) and uttering the words “sim voce”, which I think means ‘yeah’ sort of thing in Portuguese. Am I to infer that the toucan is Brazilian? it would make sense. The two toucans are different in style, one very sharp, the other a little fluffier, but they work perfectly together. This is easily the best collaboration of the year so far, in my opinion.

Having not seen Werm for an eternity, it was really nice to bump into him while he was painting this piece. What made the encounter stranger still was that we had been communicating the day before about a RichT piece that I had posted. Sometimes it is difficult not to believe in coincidence, although I know there is a whole ton of evidence to dismiss it.

Werm is trying out something a little different in this piece, and has definitely edged away from his ultra-complex wildstyle pieces of the last year or two. The notable thing about this piece is the gently pastel colours softly transitioning across all of the letters in a seemingly random sequence. The strong 3D shadow, green border and trimmings and the black buffed wall help the piece to stand out nicely. A good start to the New Year from Werm.