Organic – Natural adventures

6722. Cumberland Basin

Sait Bare, Cumberland Basin, Bristol, January 2025

Sait Bare is a wonderful graffiti writer who paints just often enough to get himself notices, and has a style of writing all of his own. He tends to present irregular letters that have an organic feel about them, as there were a live being in there somewhere.

This writing, which was painted alongside some Hire piece, has a wonderful deep, rich colour palette. The letters, spelling SAIT, merge with one another and it is the fills that drift through the piece that pick out the individual letters, but in an ephemeral way. Sait Bare’s work is really unusual and quite unlike anything else we see in Bristol.

6719. Greenway Bush Lane (2)

Solar, Greenway Bush Lane, Bristol, January 2025

I love the fact that this long hoarding in Green Bush Lane is becoming a ‘spot’ having been colonised initially by Mote and Mr Crawls – great work from these pioneers. This represents the ever-changing mosaic of graffiti spots around the city, as areas become gentrified and old spots disappear, new opportunities appear.

This is a sensational piece from Solar, and an instant winner with me. With this piece alone, the PLB artist has raised his game to the next level. He has cleverly used the ‘clean’ hoarding as his background colour and painted his piece directly on to it. No need for any buffing. His irregular letters spelling SOLAR have an organic feel to them and are beautifully outlines with a pink border. Some fabulous decorative work, including bubbled inside and outside the piece contribute to its magnificence. A piece out of the top drawer from Solar.

6459. Cumberland Basin

Mr Tanner, Cumberland Basin, Bristol, September 2024

I am really pleased that I managed to capture this piece by Mr Tanner, especially as the last one he painted under Brunel Way, when I met him for the first time while he was painting it, was overpainted by the time I returned. Such is the way of things. He was rather excited about a different style that he was working on, and I think that this piece represents that style.

There is something rather organic about this writing (and a bit lobsterish too, although I don’t think that is intentional) – there is definitely a life form there… but not as we know it, Jim. The red letters spell out TOPIA and pop beautifully against the green, cosmic charged background. I’ve said it before that green and red make great graffiti writing bedfellows. A very nice, original piece by Mr Tanner.

6224. Cumberland Basin

Ments, Cumberland Basin, Bristol, July 2024

This piece from Ments, painted as part of a wider paint jam, is a joy to behold. I am always going on about how we just don’t see enough of Ments’ work these days, and here is the second piece since May, the other being at Upfest. There is no doubt that Ments has pulled out all the stops with this one.

His characteristic ‘organic’ writing is full of mystery and shapes and textures of planet earth, like chemistry mixed up with geometry and art – a delightful combination. From what we see, there is no way of knowing what the letters spell, but it is probably a good guess to imagine that it says MENTS. There is so much to admire in the intricate details and interactions between the forms and colours in the piece. Outstanding.

6171. River Avon (63)

My rather loose description of this spot, which I call River Avon, is actually a cycle/foot path that runs alongside the river from Sparke Evans Park to Temple Meads Station, where light industrial units back on to the pathway for most of its length. This piece by j9449j (or dr3amc0re94) is at the Eastern end of the pathway, and quite easily overlooked… I only spotted it on my return leg of my walk.

The joy of j9449j’s work is in its organic simplicity. I suppose you could class it as kind of anti-style graffiti writing, but it is perhaps a little bit more designed than that. As ever, I struggle to read the letters in this piece, so shall have to remain content with the fills and suggested vegetation. j9449j is an artist I am keen to meet – I have so many questions!

6048. Brunel Way (272)

Mr Tanner, Brunel Way, Bristol, May 2024

I have said it many times, and it continues to be my firm belief, that visiting artists add an extra sparkle to the vast spectrum of street/graffiti art that we see in the city, and they are always welcome. Mr Tanner appears to have taken a bit of a shine to the city of Bristol recently and long may it last, as his pieces are original and quirky, and each one utterly different from the last.

This is a fabulous organic piece of graffiti writing from Mr Tanner, which spells out ‘TOPIA’, don’t ask me why, but it is the letters that he writes. The design is original and flows very nicely, with fill transitions that work really well and are reversed in the ‘O’. I reckon that buffing the wall might have helped the piece to stand out a little more from the Pura Decadencia piece underneath it, as the two colour palettes are competing a little. Nonetheless, this is a wonderful piece from Mr Tanner.

6039. Cumberland Basin

j9449j, Cumberland Basin, Bristol, May 2024

The Bristol street art and graffiti scene is so broad that it welcomes all styles and all levels of talent. We get to see it all here. Some towns and cities in the UK embrace street art through holding festivals, but have no underlying culture 365 days of the year. While there is nothing wrong with that at all, what remains is a sanitised selection of high-end art, keeping the place pretty. Upfest provides us with a microclimate of high-end art in the Bedminster area, but the rest of the city is up for grabs, and I like it that way.

A great example of Bristol’s artistic diversity comes in the form of artists like j9449j, whose abstract fills are really quite unique. There is a wonderful organic feel to his work, with plant-like forms cropping up through the lettering. j9449j’s work feels quite ‘designed’, if you know what I mean, and although some of the borders could be a little cleaner, there is an element of anti-style that works well. This is a bright and colourful calming piece.

5977. Cumberland Basin

j9449j, Cumberland Basin, Bristol, January 2024

The artist formerly known as j9449j is obviously a person who enjoys anonymity, and has been incredibly hard to track down. I still know nothing about the artist, and just to add to the confusion, j9449j has changed their Instagram handle to @dr3amcore, this leaves me with the dilemma I have faced before which is do I stick with the first name I was familiar with or change to the new name. The convention on Natural Adventures is to stick with the first name unless the artist requests otherwise, so that is what I will do.

This piece was photographed back in January (I was doing a bit of archive-hopping), and features writing that I have struggled to read, but to me, it looks like “L I ? A T E R”, but I can’t make sense of that, so I must be wrong. Whatever the letters, the fill patterns are full of the wonderful plant shapes that typify work by j9449j. The colour palette is not my favourite, but in my view saved by the vibrant green/yellow flashes through the piece. I have many other pieces by the artist and hope to unearth them as the months and years go by.

5937. Greenbank (114)

This is a throwback piece to last June, which has remained dormant in my archives, because at the time of photographing the piece the artist was unknown to me. Since then, the artist’s identity has emerged and is known as j9449j, which is a bit of a mouthful. This is great news, because I have several more pieces in the archives to share and I really like their work.

The abstract piece hints at a rural landscape, certainly there are some organic forms in the piece. This artwork is so original, at least in the context of street art, that it is difficult to assess against any normal criteria or conventions. For example the small additional piece to the right works perfectly as a counterbalance to the larger piece on the left, There are some lovely shapes and patterns and a carefully thought out colour palette. Enjoyable and unusual stuff from j9449j.

3875. M32 roundabout J3 (340)

It is always so good to see a new piece from Taboo, and it feels like a little while since his last one. This magnificent piece of graffiti writing is on the M32 roundabout, a wall that is seeing an ever-increasing turnover as artists compete for limited space I. The city.

Taboo, M32 roundabout, Bristol, August 2021

The letters, naturally, spell out Taboo, although it takes a little time to work it out if you aren’t used to reading his letters. Unusually for one of his pieces there is no accompanying character, although there is an animated paintbrush in the middle of the piece. His organic and unconventional style is what marks out his work as being rather special and I love it.

	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…

	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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