I get the feeling that Scrapyardspec might have moved to or near Bristol, or he is visiting more often these days, because barely a week goes by when I don’t discover a new piece by him.
This googly-eyed character is nestled neatly on the side of one of the ramps in the Dean Lane skate park, known locally as The Deaner. Perhaps the most notable thing about this piece is the green wibbly tongue, which I would estimate appears in about half of all his character pieces.
There seems to be a direct correlation between the days and locations that Kid Crayon paints, and the longevity of his pieces. More than any other artist I can think of, his work gets painted over really quickly, and I have missed several of his pieces this year, arriving a day late.
Most recently, a piece in Cumberland Basin lasted a day maybe, and worse still it was only half painted over, which is rude, and not in the spirit of the unwritten graffiti code of etiquette. I rushed to photograph this one, and of course, it has bucked the trend and lasted a while, and was still intact yesterday.
This is a superb example of Kid Crayon’s playful style, with a great combination of letters and characters throughout the piece. The piece formed a part of a Frazzled Magazine paint jam, which included the artists Mind 49, Ejits, and Smak amongst others. There is so much to enjoy in this piece with so many little details to admire, for example, the munching maggot carving pieces out of the letter ‘C’at the start of the piece. Fabulous work.
This is the middle piece of a Zinso-fest from earlier in the month underneath Brunel Way. The white buffed wall was the perfect opportunity for Zinso to practice his writing, and practice he did, turning out six pieces, three large and three small.
The bubble writing in the larger piece is beautifully decorated, each letter having its own colour scheme and one or two with spots as well. The ‘O’ at the end has a cheeky face for good measure. Similarly, the smaller signature piece in red also has a cheeky face, but appears to have a letter (S) missing. The full wall is shown below.
I wish I had photographed this piece before it got tagged up at the base, because it is another truly classy column piece by Silent Hobo underneath the M32. I have noticed that many of Silent Hobo’s recent pieces have a rather melancholic tone, and I wonder if he is expressing himself through his art and the stories it tells.
In this piece, a young man is looking rather sad, and has a wooden stake piercing his heart. I would interpret this as being heartbroken, but perhaps I am reading too much into it. What I can say is that Silent Hobo’s portrayal of Bristol youth and their preoccupations and joys is unparalleled.
This is a wonderful old school combination piece painted at the L Dub spot by Turoe, although I think that the character might be by Veks. Everything about this oozes class and experience.
The character wearing a baseball cap has been buffing the wall with a roller, thus indicating a form of self-portraiture. The letters, spelling STYLE are perfectly filled with blended horizontal shades transitioning from purple through red and orange to brown. A striped 3D drop shadow rounds off this piece off nicely and create a metallic sheen effect.
The emphasis of this post will walk through how augmentation works. In street art circles, augmentation (adding to an existing piece) is relatively rare and can be considered as a little insulting to the original artist, or lacking in creativity. On the other hand, it can be seen as flattering and complementary to the original work. Here is a wonderful example of a piece by Mr Klue that has been augmented by Posh.
This rather nice purple ‘KLUE’ abstract writing has been hanging around at the entrance to the tunnel for quite a while, which doesn’t really come as much of a surprise as he kind of ‘owns’ this spot, by occupation at least. The purple is beautifully picked out with white and yellow highlights that create wonderful depth to the piece. Now all is just fine and dandy, and then along comes Posh!
Quite a while after this piece was painted by Mr Klue, Posh came along and added into it three posh characters, in yellow, picking out some of the colour in the original piece. These ‘toffs’ have a strong political message, one that picked up a lot of coverage at the Glastonbury Festival, ‘Death 2 the IDF’. Once again, street art acts as a wonderful commentary on contemporary issues, and has an important role to play in free speech and expression. This is a great example of how augmentation can work really well, and Mr Klue thought it was rather funny.
This piece from Hire had me raising my eyebrows, in a good way, because it is quite unlike anything I have seen from him before. I would normally associate his work with quite intricate, spiky, angular letters, but here he has gone for something altogether softer and more fluid – to be honest I hind it a little disorientating. (Update – I am being particularly dense, the writing is, of course, by Sait Bare, which is why it is so different in style. I couldn’t see the wood for the trees.
The combination of letters and two characters works well, with a face on the left and one of his trademark rabbits (see, it is spiky) to the right. The letters have a traditional 3D drop shadow with black and red stripes. This whole thing looks like Hire is experimenting a bit, departing from his customary style, and that has to be applauded.
Scrapyardspec has returned to Bristol recently and dropped a whole load of pieces at spots all over the city, which seems to be his modus operandi when he visits. This multicoloured goofy face is in the little ‘tunnel’ area alongside the long wall at Cumberland Basin.
There is something completely loveable about Scrapyardspec’s characters. You pretty much know that you are going to get a wobbly face with lots of teeth and googly eyes, but there is enough variability within that formula to ensure that each piece is interesting and unique in its own way. The background colours are what mark this piece out from some of the others, being much more colourful ‘a la fruit salad’ I would say. More to come from our welcome visitor soon.
Two things immediately leap out at me about this piece by Posh; first, I am always happy to find ANY pieces by him, because he paints quite infrequently (although he has been more active lately), and second, I have never seen his work at L Dub before, so was mildly confused and surprised to see it there.
This is a combination piece in which Posh has incorporated his little ‘posh’ characters into his letters. I can’t work out what the letters spell, and a glance at his Instagram doesn’t help me with that particular piece of detective work. His little monocled figures are so full of character, mischief and fun and are an endearing element of his work. Looking out for more great work from Posh.
There are a few artists who are synonymous with the Lawrence Weston (L Dub) spot, including DJ Perks, Hypo and of course Dun Sum. This is one of his fictional creatures, a monkey -type character conjured up by his fertile imagination.
There is a lot of expression and movement in the piece, with the monkey appearing to be yelling or screeching, in the way that chimpanzees do. The shaded tones in the animal’s fur and on the teeth and tongue are expertly done, creating loads of texture and depth. This is a brilliant wildlife character piece from Dun Sum.
Natural adventures 