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Nectar festival
bright yellow flowers entice
bee does what bees do
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by Scooj

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Nectar festival
bright yellow flowers entice
bee does what bees do
.
by Scooj

This extraordinary piece by Zase is one of the most beautiful pieces in the city right now, if not the most beautiful. It is the third consecutive piece by the artist on this wall that I can remember, and like its predecessors has already become something of a landmark adjacent to the Eastville roundabout.

Continuing on today’s insect theme from Sled One’s Burberry bumblebee piece in the previous post, this piece is all about the honey bees. To the left, dandelions in flower and seed dominate the woodland (hinted) scene, while two bees navigate their way through the floating ‘parachute’ seeds.

The dandelion is, on its own, a work of art and I find myself utterly confounded as to how Zase painted this with spray paint.The finest detail has been incorporated, and his observational skills are outstanding, with the little marks left on the seed head by departed seeds.

The yellow and orange honeycomb letters spell out ZASE in some of the best anamorphic graffiti writing you’ll be lucky enough to see, and a bee has settled on the comb to the right.

The whole thing is a masterpiece and a fabulous advert for the artist who paints commissions. If I could afford it…


Will Coles certainly left his mark at Upfest 2017, with a number of different ‘installations’ dotted around the festival site and in other parts of Bristol too. This particular one chimes for a great many people in the UK, and I guess across the world, and links to the catastrophic decline in honey bee and other insect pollinator populations.

I would like to think that this is somewhat less controversial than many of his works, but it is nonetheless quite challenging politically. There are some who advocate the use of neonicotinoids and other pesticides to sustain high crop yields and guarantee food production for the nation.

Each of these honey bees were carefully placed. It was fun hunting them down.
Buzzing honey bees
guzzle fresh sweet nectar from
marjoram flowers.
by Scooj
Without question, one of the highlights of this year’s Upfest was this magnificent mural by the fabulous Louis Masai. His works are nearly always highlight threats to the environment or endangered species and on that ticket alone he ranks highly in my own personal favourite artists.

His recent murals have featured animals painted with a patchwork quilt kind of effect, and in this case the rhinoceros is being stitched together by a honey bee and a bumble bee.
It is difficult not to be impressed with this work, and not surprisingly Louis Masai’s status in the street art world has grown in the last year or two.

Definitely, definitely in my top five pieces from this year’s festival. It is a pity that it is slightly off the beaten track as many visitors to Upfest will have missed it. The piece is on the Redpoint Bristol Climbing Centre on Winterstoke Road.

It would be great if he could return next year, although I’m not sure he could better this one.