Le Imposter Design – Page 2 – Natural adventures

6806. M32 Spot (200)

One of the great pleasures over the last eight or so months has been watching the development of Lis (formerly Le Imposter Design), from an occasional line-drawing artist to a full-on and busy spray can street artist. Her transition has been swift, but he has held onto some of her original techniques and augments some of her pieces with pens for the finer detail.

This is an unusual study piece on a column in the M32 Spot. There was a tagger a few years ago who used to paint coffee pots like this all over the city, but this is the first one I have seen since then. The piece has a naive art style about it, and is fun to look at, and I wonder if it had a dual function of being a bit of a practice for borders, lines and shading. So much more to come from an artist who is in overdrive.

6765. M32 roundabout J3 (657)

Lis, M32 roundabout, Bristol, February 2025

By now, I would hope that most readers are becoming familiar with the artwork of Lis (Le Imposter Designs). Her pieces have figuratively ‘mushroomed’ all over the city and her work is becoming better known, an accolade which she has achieved in a relatively short time.

Lis has combined painting techniques in this impressive piece, using spray paint to create the body of the toadstool and the thick border, stencils for the stars, and fine line marker pens for the detail. Altogether a very ‘Lis’ kind of piece.

6720. Greenbank (151)

Lis (Le Imposter Design), Greenbank, Bristol, January 2025

We long for those sunny winter days, they offer us a taste of a spring to come and provide a break from the monotony of overcast and wet weather that is typical of an English winter. The only drawback in my mind is that sunny winter days spell trouble for photographing art on walls, and that explains the long shadows on this piece by Lis (Le Imposter Designs).

Recently, Lis made the switch from her usual brushes and paint materials to spray paint, and has started ‘going large’ with her street art. It is a fascinating transformation, and what she has lost in the fine detail of her work, she has gained with ‘in your face’ impact. This portrait of a cat appears to be full of symbolism, with the character sitting in front of a crystal ball and wrapped in a stellar coat. Her spray paint work at this stage is a little one dimensional at this stage, but that is to be expected. I am full of admiration for her perseverance, and I am hoping to see much more of her work this year – she certainly appears to have the bug.

6681. Dean Lane skate park (800)

Lis (Le Imposter Design), Dean Lane, Bristol, January 2025

So it looks like Lis (Le Imposter Design) has found herself some cans (perhaps they were a Christmas present), and given some full-on spray-painting a go. I absolutely love it when artists get a taste for street art and broaden their horizons, and Lis has found the perfect spot for a bit of practise.

Naturally, her subject is still very much mushrooms, but this time without the precision of fine brushes to mark out the detail. When you move on to spray paint, everything has to be scaled up, but I have to say she has done a great job with these eyed fungi. I would think that she has used cans before, because these are nicely painted, and she has a steady hand, but sometimes people are simply naturals. I wonder where Lys will take us next… all aboard!

6663. Greenbank (146)

Lis (Le Imposter Design), Greenbank, Bristol, December 2024

It is an interesting discussion to try and determine what constitutes graffiti or street art, and I don’t intend to go into a long essay about it right now. Within the community, there are all kinds of tribal differences, between graffiti writers, stencil artists, wheatpasters, character artists, muralists and studio artists. My take is that if it is on the street, then it all comes under the banner of street art, and I am always happy to feature it here on Natural Adventures. I’ll leave it to others to argue the finer points. I mention this because of an emerging talent, Lis (formerly Le Imposter Design), whose hand painted mushroom pieces are causing a little bit of a stir.

Lis’ illustrative style is so very different from anything else we see on the street and, in my view, adds to the richness of the street art culture in Bristol. Her talent as an illustrator is obvious, and I love the way she is occupying small spaces on walls all over the city, treating us to interesting fungus-scapes. These orange mushrooms are accompanied by some smaller toadstools and plants as well as some little white symbols around the piece. Great work from Lis and a taste of more to come in 2025 (I dearly hope).

6596. St Werburghs tunnel (465)

Lis (Le Imposter Design), St Werburghs, Bristol, December 2024

I am always encouraged when I see studio artists exercising their subversive side by painting illegal walls, with their different take on street art, and a recent emerging talent is Lis AKA Le Imposter Design. Her work seems to feature nature a fair bit and in particular, mushrooms.

This piece, presumably entitled ‘party shrooms’ depicts three mushrooms or toadstools having a good time dancing to an imaginary beat. The piece was painted over the corner of a Hypo piece, but in a respectful way, with four black corner tabs, as if it were a photograph inserted into an album. I am loving the emergence of Lys and am very much looking forward to finding more of her work in future.

6572. Greenbank (141)

Le Imposter Design, Greenbank, Bristol, June 2024

Street art takes many forms, and encompasses so much more than graffiti writing and spray-painted portraits, characters or scenes. It is a broad church that encompasses murals using spray paint or other painting materials, paste-ups and installations large and small. Hardcore followers like to stick with spray paint work, but I like to find and write about all forms of street artwork, and this wonderful toadstool piece by Le Imposter Design is a perfect example of a modest hand-painted tiny mural.

I have posted all the Le Imposter Design pieces that I have found (three so far), because I feel they help to represent this vast spectrum of street art in Bristol. Most of her work features plants or fungus, and this is a particularly nice example, with a purple-capped toadstool and some rather pretty ground plants and flowers. She has added some little stars, to add a little bit of context and atmosphere. The piece is small and low down on the hoarding. Blink and you would miss it. More to come from Le Imposter Design.

6384. Montpelier Park

Le Imposter Design, Montpelier Park, Bristol, September 2024

As somebody who spends quite a lot of my spare time hunting down street/graffiti art, I find I get a great amount of pleasure when I find things that are slightly out of the ordinary, and this piece, the second I have posted by Le Imposter Design, is definitely out of the ordinary.

Her small designs tend to be quite low down – I wonder if she sits while she is painting, because otherwise this would be back-breaking work. Here we have a little window into a world of toadstools painted with brushes and plenty of fine detail. I suspect I might have another of her fungus pieces in my archive, but it is un-signed. I really hope that Le Imposter Design continues with these little gems, because they offer something quite unique on the Bristol scene.

6341. Greenbank (133)

Le Imposter Design, Greenbank, Bristol, August 2024

This is exactly the type of discovery I love to make, and highlights why I do what I do. The Bristol to Bath cycle path is a very busy thoroughfare for cyclists and walkers alike. The vast majority of footfall (or wheel-fall) passing the long hoarding alongside the Chocolate Factory development, will miss this little gem, and some of the larger gems here too, being more focussed on getting from A to B. Observers of the world, however’, will stop and enjoy treats like this one from another first-timer on Natural Adventures, Le Imposter Design.

This modest design is dwarfed by the larger pieces of graffiti writing and street art surrounding it, and is easily overlooked, being at about knee to waist height. The art piece sets out a wonderful view out of a window and onto the street. There are lots of little details to enjoy, the plant and pot, coffee with a heart shape in the froth, some paperwork, and even a stall and awning on a building across the street. Wonderful calming stuff in a frenetic spot. A big welcome to Le Imposter Design, I hope to see more of her work before too long.

	paulh121 on 7352. Cumberland Basin
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	paulh121 on 7352. Cumberland Basin
	Sheree on 7352. Cumberland Basin
	paulh121 on 7350. Hillgrove Street (9…
	Bill Bisgood on Thursday doors – 11 Dece…
	scooj on Thursday doors – 11 Dece…

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