6365. Cheltenham 2023 (5)

Krimsone, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Town Centre East car park, Cheltenham, July 2024
Krimsone, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Town Centre East car park, Cheltenham, July 2024

Here are three more wonderful pieces from the Cheltenham Paint Festival this year, and I have to say that Andy Davies, the Director and organiser of the event, has excelled in gathering a blend of international, national and local artists together to show off their talent. I believe that 2024 is the best one yet. This first enormous piece, on the side of the Town Centre East car park, is by Krimsone, an artist I have only once before come across at Upfest 2017. This is a top class portrait piece worked to fit the tall wall perfectly, with a vase delicately balanced on the woman’s head taking up the top half of the wall. Incredible stuff.

#DFTE, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Honeybourne Line tunnel, Cheltenham, July 2024
#DFTE, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Honeybourne Line tunnel, Cheltenham, July 2024

As reliable as ever, Bristol artist #DFTE manages to raise a smile with his appropriately coloured writing exclaiming “Totally Bananas”. Fabulous drips.

Fark, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Princess Elizabeth Way, Cheltenham, July 2024
Fark, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Princess Elizabeth Way, Cheltenham, July 2024

Finally in this mini selection, Fark, who is a regular at street art festivals, presents one of his superb birds with precision and tidiness. Great work.

6364. Cheltenham 2024 (4)

Snug One, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2023, Sherborne Place Car Park, Cheltenham, July 2024
Snug One, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2023, Sherborne Place Car Park, Cheltenham, July 2024

I took these pictures at this year’s Cheltenham festival, although the first image featuring an extraordinary piece by Smug One is from the Cheltenham Paint Festival 2023. I managed to catch up with Smug One as he was finishing off this stag beetle piece “Monarch of the End”, but rain was forecast and he was rather agitated that he might not be able to complete it before it came. I often present Cheltenham pieces a year late, because many are incomplete at the time of my visiting the festival, and I tend to only visit once a year. This is a magnificent piece.

Benzi Brofman, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, North Place car park, Cheltenham, July 2024
Benzi Brofman, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, North Place car park, Cheltenham, July 2024

I don’t know Benzi Brofman at all, but I rather like this irreverent take on family life with the line “Being normal is boring”. The sentiment of the picture taps into the subversive nature of street art and I rather like it. 

LPVDA, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Swindon Road, Cheltenham, July 2024
LPVDA, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Swindon Road, Cheltenham, July 2024

I also don’t know the French? artist LPVDA but his Instagram feed is fascinating. It looks like he creates his work using an angle grinder, etching out images on wooden ‘canvases’. The effect is stunning and it is amazing how he achieves depth and tone just by altering the depth of his grinding. 

All three pieces are wonderful.

6268. Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024 (3)

Epod 3000, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Dunalley Street, Cheltenham, July 2024
Epod 3000, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Dunalley Street, Cheltenham, July 2024

Good morning and welcome to another brand-new week. What better way to kick off than with the third trio of pieces photographed at this year’s Cheltenham Paint Festival? One of the notable things about the festival, which I am sure I will return to at some point, is that Andy ‘Dice’ Davies and his organising team are constantly finding new walls to decorate, meaning that existing murals get to stay where they are, constantly growing the outdoor gallery, which becomes an increasing draw for visitors and inward investment. If only the festival was able to gain more confidence from funders, which I know was a real struggle this year.

Epod 3000, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Dunalley Street, Cheltenham, July 2024
Epod 3000, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Dunalley Street, Cheltenham, July 2024

Fresh from his appearance at Upfest in Bristol, Epod, who is firmly on the festival circuit, produced this beauty on the side of the Holiday Inn Express, enhancing the visual value of the building tenfold at least. A stunning portrait of a beautiful woman with a sound system in her hair… and why not?

Fark, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, North Place car park, Cheltenham, July 2024
Fark, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, North Place car park, Cheltenham, July 2024

Next up is this very neat and tidy piece from Fark, who has become a CPF favourite and who managed to wheatpaste up his name pretty much everywhere I went in the town. A view, a rainbow and a bird – you cannot go wrong.

Wolfskulljack, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Two Pigs, Cheltenham, July 2024
Wolfskulljack, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Two Pigs, Cheltenham, July 2024

Finally, another favourite at the CPF is Wolfskulljack whose Gothic-style Posca pen sketches are utterly captivating and technically brilliant. Her study of animals and their form is a joy to behold, and there is always a sense of menace or threat about her work.

I’ll be posting more from Cheltenham in due course.

6267. Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024 (2)

Roo, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, North Place car park, Cheltenham, July 2024
Roo, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, North Place car park, Cheltenham, July 2024

So this is the second of the first three posts from the Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024. I have had to pull together three pieces in each post, simply so that I can fit them in with my regular posts of Bristol street art. Things have never been so busy, and at the end of each month I still have dozens of unposted pieces, because there is so much great art being produced out there. I can’t get close to posting it all.

Roo, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, North Place car park, Cheltenham, July 2024
Roo, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, North Place car park, Cheltenham, July 2024

It was a pleasure to watch as Roo finished off this wonderful piece, and catch up with her in the Two Pigs where she was selling her merch. This is a great piece that tells a fun story of a frog and a ‘no swimming’ sign. I think it might just be one of my favourite Roo piece ever.

Apparan, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, East car park, Cheltenham, July 2024
Apparan, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, East car park, Cheltenham, July 2024

In the car park is this outstanding portrait piece by Apparan, who is not a stranger to Natural Adventures, having posted an Upfest piece and one from Stratford in London in the past.

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The portrait is beautifully accompanied with a flower and a beguiling background, which certainly brightens up an otherwise ordinary concrete car park wall.

Codo, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, North Place car park, Cheltenham, July 2024
Codo, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, North Place car park, Cheltenham, July 2024

Rounding off this small selection of three pieces from the CPF is this excellent piece by Codo, who I met at last year’s festival and who was very kind to me, giving me some caps and paint. His intricate doodle work is superb, and brings out the best in the central character which is a large version of the smaller background symbols and characters. Some very nice pieces from Cheltenham. Three more to come tomorrow.

6266. Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024 (1)

Curtis Hylton, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Barnyard Close, Cheltenham, July 2024
Curtis Hylton, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Barnyard Close, Cheltenham, July 2024

A couple of weekends ago I managed to spend a day at the Cheltenham Paint festival, which was amazing, and organiser Andy ‘Dice’ Davies and his team should be congratulated for building the event into one of the best paint festivals in the UK, and in a town that has quite a small graffiti/street art sub-culture. I took so many pictures of pieces from this year and previous years, that I will be bunching them together in my posts of the festival, due to sheer volume of photographs in my folders.

Curtis Hylton, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Barnyard Close, Cheltenham, July 2024
Curtis Hylton, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Barnyard Close, Cheltenham, July 2024

Here we start with a wonderful piece from Curtis Hilton on the edge of the town, with a signature piece of a bird composed of  flower petals.

DFC1848, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Honeybourne Line tunnel, Cheltenham, July 2024
DFC1848, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, Honeybourne Line tunnel, Cheltenham, July 2024

Next up is a large piece by local artist DFC1848. How magnificently the gold colour on the diver’s helmet picks up the texture of the wall and appears to glisten. Really nice cartoon character fun.

Stephen Quick, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, North Place car park, Cheltenham, July 2024
Stephen Quick, Cheltenham Paint Festival 2024, North Place car park, Cheltenham, July 2024

Finally, for this first burst of three pieces from the festival, a stunner from Stephen Quick, a Bristol Stencil Artist, who I caught up with for a moment. He said the he left the peeling white paint on purpose to add texture and interest to the piece. Such a nice man by the way. More of these Cheltenham compilations to follow.

6205. Cheltenham 2023 (17)

This is the second small gallery of Cheltenham art photographed at the Cheltenham Paint Festival 2023. I am posting this as the 2024 festival begins at the end of this week, and I felt it would be good to share some of last year’s pieces as a bit of a warm up.

Not all the pieces were painted last year – the Alex Lucas mural (feature image) was painted a few years ago, but I only got round to photographing it last year. I hope to be visiting Cheltenham for this year’s festival alongside Paul H, and am getting pretty excited about it all. Enjoy the gallery:

Alex Lucas, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023
Alex Lucas, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023

Alex Lucas, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023
Alex Lucas, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023

This piece was actually painted in 2020 for the Cheltenham Paint Festival. Still looking magnificent.

Ajax Piper, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023
Ajax Piper, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023

I don’t know an awful lot about Ajax Piper, but I believe he is a British artist who hasn’t been painting for too long, or so his website might suggest.

Wispa, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023
Wispa, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023

A wonderfully colourful and vibrant piece by RBF artist Wispa (featured reasonably regularly on Natural Adventures).

3rdeye, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023
3rdeye, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023

3rdeye has produced this typically mysterious piece with one of his creature characters and plenty of eyes.

Curtis Hylton, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023
Curtis Hylton, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023

One of the featured artists at the CPF 2023 was Curtis Hylton, who smashed it with this outstanding large mural on the side wall of the Holiday Inn Express hotel in the centre of town.

I will need to do a few more posts from the CPF 2023, and some more unposted pieces from Upfests passim. So much to do and so little time to do it.

6204. Cheltenham 2023 (16)

Everything is catching up with me. The Cheltenham Paint Festival begins next weekend, although I believe some pieces are already well underway. The problem for me is that I still have loads of pieces from last year’s festival that I haven’t posted, so here are a few pieces that I’d like to share by way of a warm-up act for next week. I will do this as a mini gallery, because I don’t have time to write up each individual piece.

Paul Monsters, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023
Paul Monsters, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023

Bristol artist Paul Monsters doing what he does best.

Heat One and Shade One, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023
Heat One and Shade One, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023

Shade One, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023
Shade One, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023

superb collaboration from Shade One and Heat One.

Joe Greenaway, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023
Joe Greenaway, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023

An interesting piece from Joe Greenway

Philth, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023
Philth, Cheltenham Paint Festival, Cheltenham, July 2023

Finally an outstanding floral piece from Philth, which was tricky to photograph because of the car parked directly in front of it.

More from the Cheltenham Paint Festival 2023 in tomorrow’s post.

Thursday doors – 27 June 2024 – Doors from Cheltenham

Doors 269 – Doors from Cheltenham, July 2023 (Part III)

Good morning from Bristol, where the mood has been lifted by a couple of wonderful warm days, although the clouds today probably signify the end of our summer! This week I bring you the final selection of doors from a visit I made to Cheltenham last July to experience the Cheltenham Paint Festival. There is not too much to say about these doors other than they are a random selection from my wanderings, I hope you enjoy them.

Double doors, one without door furniture, Cheltenham, July 2023
Double doors, one without door furniture, Cheltenham, July 2023

Typical Cheltenham door with ironwork awning, Cheltenham, July 2023
Typical Cheltenham door with ironwork awning, Cheltenham, July 2023

A new door (looks unpainted) with ironwork awning, Cheltenham, July 2023
A new door with ironwork awning, Cheltenham, July 2023

Cherrington Chambers double doors, Cheltenham, July 2023
Cherrington Chambers double doors, Cheltenham, July 2023

Grand entrance, door and fanlight window, Cheltenham, July 2023
Grand entrance, door and fanlight window, Cheltenham, July 2023

Green door, steps and wonderful fanlight window, Cheltenham, July 2023
Green door, steps and wonderful fanlight window, Cheltenham, July 2023

Door with graffiti and 'Apache attack helicopter' stencils, Cheltenham, July 2023
Door with graffiti and ‘Apache attack helicopter’ stencils, Cheltenham, July 2023

I have a busy day ahead, so that’s it I’m afraid for another week. Next time I am thinking a return to Umbria in Italy is on the cards, see you then.

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 Thursday Doors post.

by Scooj

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Thursday doors – 6 June 2024 – Doors from Cheltenham

Doors 267 – Doors from Cheltenham, July 2023 (Part II)

I don’t have a great deal to say about the selection of doors this week, except that I took the photographs during a visit to last year’s Cheltenham Paint Festival, and of course, whenever I visit a town or city, for whatever reason, you will find me collecting doors or taking doorscursions. On that subject, I am off to York again next week and I am hoping to find some time to wander around York Minster and the surrounding area… watch this space (in about a year – my archive of doors is swelling).

There is no theme to these doors, but I hope you enjoy the collection nonetheless:

Recessed wooden door with a fine stone archway, Cheltenham, July 2023
Recessed wooden door with a fine stone archway, Cheltenham, July 2023

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Recessed door with a fine stone archway and windows, Cheltenham, July 2023
Recessed door with a fine stone archway and windows, Cheltenham, July 2023

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Grey, tatty door, Cheltenham, July 2023
Grey, tatty door, Cheltenham, July 2023

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Ordinary black door with typically 'Cheltenham' awning, Cheltenham, July 2023
Ordinary black door with typically ‘Cheltenham’ awning, Cheltenham, July 2023

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Do it yourself door decorations, Cheltenham, July 2023
Do it yourself door decorations, Cheltenham, July 2023

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Splendid white door and surround plus untintional doorfie, Cheltenham, July 2023
Splendid white door and surround plus unintentional doorfie, Cheltenham, July 2023

One more week of Cheltenham doors to come, and then possibly a return to Italy. Have a great weekend.

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 Thursday Doors post.

by Scooj

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Thursday doors – 30 May 2024 – Doors from Cheltenham

Doors 266 – Doors from Cheltenham, July 2023 (Part I)

Last July, I made my annual pilgrimage to Cheltenham for the Cheltenham Paint Festival, which thanks to the tireless efforts of the organiser Andy Davies (Dice 67) is going from strength to strength. Of course, I took the opportunity (not for the first time) to photograph some doors while I was there. Cheltenham is a funny place in that it has some expensive and exclusive properties cheek by jowl with what we call these days ‘affordable housing’ (none of which is particularly affordable, but that discussion is for another day). The result is an eclectic mix of doors and periods – here is a taster for my first of three collections from last year’s visit:

Yellow door with an oval window, Cheltenham, July 2023
Yellow door with an oval window, Cheltenham, July 2023
Door with a flat-roofed awning, Cheltenham, July 2023
Door with a flat-roofed awning, Cheltenham, July 2023
Former Beatrice von Tresckow design shop font, Cheltenham, July 2023
Former Beatrice von Tresckow design shop font, Cheltenham, July 2023
Door to Former Beatrice von Tresckow design shop font, Cheltenham, July 2023
Door to Former Beatrice von Tresckow design shop font, Cheltenham, July 2023
Blue door, Ionic columns and an ornate veranda, Cheltenham, July 2023
Blue door, Ionic columns and an ornate veranda, Cheltenham, July 2023
Black door and ornate veranda, Cheltenham, July 2023
Black door and ornate veranda, Cheltenham, July 2023
Black door and steps, Cheltenham, July 2023
Black door and steps, Cheltenham, July 2023
Double doors with one sealed up, Cheltenham, July 2023
Double doors with one sealed up, Cheltenham, July 2023

I recall that I posted this last door once before in September 2019, although it looked quite different then. It is interesting how a lick of paint can completely transform the look of a building, and the impression it gives.

Pity about the scaffolding! Cheltenham, September 2019
Pity about the scaffolding! Cheltenham, September 2019

That just about wraps it up for this week, and I hope it serves as a taster for the next two Thursday Doors I’ll be posting. May I wish you a pleasant weekend.

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 Thursday Doors post.

by Scooj

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