In late October
Westonbirt Arboretum
leafy canopies
display their red, gold and green
magnificence, for our joy.
by Scooj. Photograph courtesy of Scoojette.
Tag: Nature
434. Upfest 2016 (50)
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.
Louis Masai, Redpoint, Upfest, Bristol, July 2016
Louis Masai, Redpoint, Upfest, Bristol, July 2016
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.
422. North Street, No. 274
This amazing Tiger is no longer there; the wall has since been painted by Jody for Upfest 2016 (more on this to come). The tiger was painted for the Upfest 2015 festival and I never really got round to posting about it.
It is funny how things come about. I didn’t really know the artist, Osch (Otto Schade), until fairly recently and now I seem to be coming across his work all over the place in London. In fact I think I mentioned in a recent post that he hadn’t done much in Bristol. I was wrong, he did this.
The tiger is captivating and uses Osch’s unraveling bandage style of artwork. This work was something of a landmark on North Street and was part of a campaign to raise awareness for the Save Wild Tigers charity.
On the downside, this is one of the most difficult Upfest walls to photograph. It is very high and in a narrow lane and the best views are from a privately accessed roof. I’m afraid I didn’t have access, so my pictures are a little distorted.
418. Upfest 2016 (45)
Krishna Malla is an illustrator from Cornwall. As a frequent visitor to Cornwall, I need to seek out some of his work, as street art is hard to come by down there. His wonderful work at Upfest, of a snail (what is it about snails…see 3Dom’s recent work in Stokes Croft) contains two of his alias’ ‘Hare’ and ‘Tech Moon’.
He has a nice website, in which his ‘About’ section reads as follows:
“Street artist and illustrator from Cornwall.
I like doing drawings.”
That’s pretty cool. Krishna Malla teaches at the Arts University Bournemouth, which is also pretty cool. Given that Bristol is somewhere between Cornwall and Bournemouth, it would be nice to think he might drop by and paint something new for us sometime.
406. Upfest 2016 (39)
I posted about this collaborating pair only a few days ago when I wasn’t sure who the artists were. Now I know who they are, I feel that I can write about them with a little more confidence. The work, which was one of the many in South Street Park, was a subtle collaboration between Serge KB and Simian Switch, surrounded by highly colourful and eye-catching pieces.
I loved the artwork in this, in particular Serge KB’s ‘deer’ which was extremely similar to the one he sprayed at the M32. Perhaps he was practicing for the festival? Simian Switches ‘octopus’ grappling with spray cans brings an element of humour to the piece too.
Both artists left ‘extras’ in the area which I will post about when I get through a little more of my ridiculous backlog of photographs. Street artists stop for nobody.
403. Upfest 2016 (36)
Tucked away on the Ashton Gate School playground wall is this subtle and intriguing piece by Feoflip. There is such wonderful detail surrounding the crow, with little figures climbing onto the top half, which has the appearance of a ship. A wonderfully imaginative piece and one that merits prolonged scrutiny.
Feoflip’s biography in the Upfest programme reads:
‘Feoflip means spray paint, latex, chalk,…on a wall, strange characters, bio-mechanical animals, botany, robotics and endless metamorphosis that recycle and pervert logic and reasoning’.
That pretty much sums it up! Great stuff.
Great to see that Feoflip also left a few extras lurking in Bristol during his visit to the city – more on these later.
400. The Bearpit (25)
It is fitting that my 400th post on street art should feature Aspire. It is difficult to tire of his incredible graffiti pictures of birds. This fine bird in the incongruous setting of The Bearpit is an American Goldfinch and can still be found at the end of the Southern tunnel.
Aspire really needs to get out to New York and paint for the Audubon Mural Project, he even paints American birds! I’m not sure how artists get an invitation to paint for the project, but it must be time for Aspire? In the meantime, we’ll just enjoy his work here in Bristol.
398. M32 Roundabout J3 (17)
UPDATE: Instagram to the rescue…this work it appears is a collaboration between Serge KB (Kortenbroek) and Simian Switch, both from the Netherlands. In this work, the animal is the work of Serge KB and the background by Simian Switch.
Generally I don’t like to post an artwork unless I know who it is by, but occasionally the interweb lets me down, and I just can’t seem to track down the artist. This is one such case.
This lovely work appeared around the same time as Upfest, so I am guessing that the artist isn’t local, or if they are, I haven’t seen any of their work before. There was another piece at Dean Lane skate park by the same artist which appeared at the same time, but no obvious signature there either. I love this piece, the colour selections and the depiction of the animal create quite a unique feel. It is simply beautiful, and I felt I had to post it to share it, but also to possibly get some insight from readers as to who the artist is.
393. Chance Street, Shoreditch, London (1)
I think it is safe to say that Roa must make it into most street art/graffiti art enthusiasts’ top ten, particularly those interested in wildlife and nature. On my latest work trip to London, I had another overnight stay and took advantage by finding a hotel not too far from Shoreditch.
I walked towards Brick Lane and found this wonderful, enormous hedgehog. Roa’s work is almost always in black and white tones and is picked out especially well on brickwork. The style is unmistakable and unique, sometimes a difficult thing to achieve in a crowded and growing scene.
When I was a youth, hedgehogs were abundant, so much so that they were very regular victims of road kill, even in cities. I even used to feed a family of them in my London back garden. Now alas, they are very much in decline. In fact this Roa depiction is the only hedgehog I have seen for about twenty years. It is a wonderful reminder of the splendour of this little creature. Thank you Roa.
390. Upfest 2016 (34)
There are some artists who are quite unique, because of their style, subject matter or materials. Shok 1 is one such artist. I don’t know if anyone else does what he does, or at least with so much skill.
Shok 1 is a British artist who specialises in X-ray images. Watching him work was amazing. He uses a small image for reference, and then sprays out every detail on a large wall. His attention to detail is just exceptional. I watched him ‘mist’ an area on the bottom right of the piece, and over five minutes he must have sprayed the same spot twenty times, with different densities of spray.
Shok 1, Upfest, North Street, Bristol, July 2016
Shok 1, Upfest, North Street, Bristol, July 2016
Shok 1, Upfest, North Street, Bristol, July 2016
Shok 1, Upfest, North Street, Bristol, July 2016
I don’t know where he got the X-ray of the unicorn from, but it must be a pretty rare thing.
Shok 1 was a lead artist at Upfest and quite deservedly so. It is amazing to have one of his pieces in Bristol as I don’t recall seeing one here before. I hope he returns next year, or sooner. Almost pure perfection.
Natural adventures 