Tag: Portrait

5067. St Werburghs tunnel (358)

Zake and Chill, St Werburghs, Bristol, March 2023
Zake and Chill, St Werburghs, Bristol, March 2023

I love the irrepressible nature of Bristol street artists. There has been a bit of a war on this wall recently, with Bristol City Council buffing the wall with grey paint, only to be painted over moments later by artists and writers. For goodness’ sake, BCC, make this a legal wall and save your (our) money. Two of Bristol’s best character artists, Zake and Chill, have combined to decorate this wall, and have absolutely smashed it.

Zake, St Werburghs, Bristol, March 2023
Zake, St Werburghs, Bristol, March 2023

I go away for a couple of days, and what happens? This audacious piece appears, to engage and entertain passers-by. Zake has been on fire recently, and is arguably the busiest artist in town. His portraits are becoming more expressive and adventurous with each outing. Watching his work develop is one of the great pleasures of what I do.

Chill, St Werburghs, Bristol, March 2023
Chill, St Werburghs, Bristol, March 2023

Chill has also now become firmly established in the Bristol scene, which doesn’t equate to him being establishment (just in case you were wondering). In this piece, Chill is continuing his experimentation with colour, instead of presenting us with the black and white we are more accustomed to seeing. I think the colours are working, although it takes a little bit of getting used to. What a wonderwall from these PWA artists.

5057. M32 roundabout J3 (455)

Stivs, M32 roundabout, Bristol, February 2023
Stivs, M32 roundabout, Bristol, February 2023

Stivs has been absolutely smashing it with his character pieces lately. Better known for his calligraffiti writing, who knew that his artistic skills are so much broader than that. He really is an exceptionally talented and diligent artist.

Stivs, M32 roundabout, Bristol, February 2023
Stivs, M32 roundabout, Bristol, February 2023

This beautiful girl character piece forms the letter ‘S’ in the middle of DSC, his crew letters and he has named this piece Dodgy Sheila Crew – playing with the letters. Stivs is using these orange tones in his character pieces at the moment, and they are extremely effective, in a way that greens, blues and greys etc might not be.

Stivs, M32 roundabout, Bristol, February 2023
Stivs, M32 roundabout, Bristol, February 2023

I am including an almost complete piece that Stivs painted a day or two before this one, which had been painted overt by the time I went back to get a clean shot of the finished work. It is another stunning portrait piece. In recent weeks Stivs has taken his work onto another level.

5048. M32 Cycle path (199)

 

Pekoe, M32 Cycle path, Bristol, February 2023
Pekoe, M32 Cycle path, Bristol, February 2023

It is a curious thing when an artist paints over their own work, but that is what happened in this instance. Maybe Pekoe didn’t like her last portrait piece here, or maybe she didn’t want to paint over anyone else’s work out of politeness, who knows, but the replacement is an upgrade in my view, and anything from her is always a bonus in my book.

Pekoe, M32 Cycle path, Bristol, February 2023
Pekoe, M32 Cycle path, Bristol, February 2023

The portrait is painted in purple tones, with blue hair, and the girl carries a slightly anxious expression. Many of Pekoe’s portraits are tinged with sadness, but I don’t think that is the case here, for a start, there are no tears. Some subtle shading brings depth to the face, and the white circles emphasise the lips and eyes. This is another beautiful piece from Pekoe.

Pekoe, M32 Cycle path, Bristol, February 2023
Pekoe, M32 Cycle path, Bristol, February 2023

5000. Greenbank (69)

Rozalita, Greenbank, Bristol, February 2023
Rozalita, Greenbank, Bristol, February 2023

Ta da! This post marks something of a landmark for me and Natural Adventures… it is the 5,000th street/graffiti art post. Natural Adventures has come a long way from its origination as a place to document a journal I kept of an adventure in the South Atlantic in 1987. Haiku and street art just crept up on me, and have now become a central pillar in my life.

I cannot think of a better way to celebrate this milestone than with an outstanding and passionate piece by Rozalita AKA Rohzi.

Rozalita, Greenbank, Bristol,

I was fortunate enough to have a long chat with Rohzi as she was buffing the wall for this piece, and once the conversation got going, she really opened up and I was thoroughly enjoying myself until the dog decided he’d had enough and started to bark, which means he wants to go. The conversation ended a little too abruptly for my liking, but it is an occupational hazard when walking the dog and photographing street art.

Rozalita mentioned that the portrait was of people from an Amazonian tribe, and she was going to leave a hashtag on the piece to find out more, but that didn’t seem to happen. The portrait itself is exceptional and demonstrates just how far she has come over the last year or two. I do hope it isn’t too long before I get a chance to continue our chat.

4972. Dean Lane skate park (559)

Mind Control, St Werburghs, Bristol, January 2023
Mind Control, St Werburghs, Bristol, January 2023

As artists develop, they often change their names or identities, and that has happened with Mind Control, who naw goes by the name Mind 49. This kind of name change presents me with a bit of a conundrum. Do I continue my posts referring to the artist under their old name (which makes my whole system of filing and archiving so much easier) or switch to their new name? As you can see from the image captions, I have decided to go with Mind Control’s old name for the time being.

Mind Control, St Werburghs, Bristol, January 2023
Mind Control, St Werburghs, Bristol, January 2023

Mind Control has come such a long way, and his latent talent as a teenager is shining through now. This portrait piece in the tunnel is a first-class piece of art, that has a strong fine art feel to it. I have commented before that Mind Control’s work always seems to have an element of menace and I sense that here… the covering of the face and the chain tell you that all is not entirely well here. A fine piece indeed.

4971. Dean Lane skate park (560)

Rusk and Shade One, Dean Lane, Bristol, January 2022
Rusk and Shade One, Dean Lane, Bristol, January 2022

Well, Rusk and Shade One have done it again with this collaboration and completely blown me away. This is their second recent collaboration in this spot, and with any luck, there will be more to follow. The writing and character formula seems to work so very well with these two, and although there is no crossover of style, there is something complementary about the two pieces.

Rusk, Dean Lane, Bristol, January 2022
Rusk, Dean Lane, Bristol, January 2022

To the left is some very tidy writing from Rusk, which stands proud from the wall with some clever fills, shading and shadows. There is a kind of metallic feel to these letters which are filled exquisitely.

Shade One, Dean Lane, Bristol, January 2022
Shade One, Dean Lane, Bristol, January 2022

To the right is the Shade One portrait of a woman, but I am not too sure who the subject is. With each new piece, Shade One is gently transitioning from a cartoon style to something more photorealistic, and I have to say that I am loving it. Another terrific collaboration from these two.

4964. Purdown (49)

Slakarts, Purdown, Bristol, January 2023
Slakarts, Purdown, Bristol, January 2023

I am guessing that Slakarts is busy these days in his non-street art life, because 2022 has been a very quiet year for him, and this is one of only a handful of pieces I have seen in a long time. This is how it goes for most street/graffiti artists, peaks and troughs of activity for a multitude of different reasons. It was fabulous, therefore, to come across this piece up at Purdown.

Slakarts, Purdown, Bristol, January 2023
Slakarts, Purdown, Bristol, January 2023

Slakarts tends to maintain his central character, pimping it with ever more elaborate ideas. In this piece, the character is on the left, but the whole piece is a bit of a mash-up of randomly distributed elements of the character’s features, a nose, teeth, an ear and a tongue are thrown into the mix. Nicely designed and thought out. Let’s hope Slakarts can get out more in 2023.

4948. Upper York Street (28)

Hazard, Upper York Street, Bristol, May 2022
Hazard, Upper York Street, Bristol, May 2022

It is extraordinary and quite unforgivable that this isn’t the only Hazard piece that hasn’t made it onto Natural Adventures over the last year, and I will have to go back and find the others, because no self-respecting chronicler of Bristol street art, would have allowed this to happen. I can’t explain myself. Perhaps this appalling situation arose because the first time I photographed the piece, there were railings up against it. Who knows?

Hazard, Upper York Street, Bristol, May 2022
Hazard, Upper York Street, Bristol, May 2022

The portrait piece is superbly painted, especially when you consider the heavily textured stonework on the wall, and is a tribute to the late Skibadee who died at the very young age of 47 last February. The portrait is a great one and hints back at some of her earlier works in which the two sides of the face are bathed in different colours. This is just one of so many outstanding pieces by Hazard.

4942. Various locations

Bogat, Brunel Way, Bristol, March 2022
Bogat, Brunel Way, Bristol, March 2022

Bogat is an artist who is underrepresented on Natural Adventures, so this flurry of pieces that I photographed in March last year should go some way to addressing this. Although I took the pictures in March 2022, some of the pieces in the M32 J2 tunnels may have been there for a while.

Bogat, Brunel Way, Bristol, March 2022
Bogat, Brunel Way, Bristol, March 2022

Bogat, who often painted alongside Asre, has a thing for open-mouthed portraits and the occasional octopus. The piece above, from Brunel way, is rather nicely done, with some nice shading on the octopus and its tentacles providing some depth. I rather like the bubbles rising off the writing, too, and filling the black space.

Bogat, M32 roundabout J2, Bristol, March 2022
Bogat, M32 roundabout J2, Bristol, March 2022

The rest of the pieces were photographed in the tunnels of the M32 roundabout junction 2, a few hundred meters North East of the junction 3 roundabout, which is a much more popular spot.

Bogat, M32 roundabout J2, Bristol, March 2022
Bogat, M32 roundabout J2, Bristol, March 2022

These tunnels are quite narrow, and dark, making photography something of a challenge. Somehow I managed to capture these pieces reasonably well, perhaps because they are in a portrait orientation rather than landscape.

Bogat, M32 roundabout J2, Bristol, March 2022
Bogat, M32 roundabout J2, Bristol, March 2022

It feels good to have posted these pieces, even if they have been collected together into one post. If I didn’t do that, then there is a real possibility that they would remain in the archives forever.

Bogat, M32 roundabout J2, Bristol, March 2022
Bogat, M32 roundabout J2, Bristol, March 2022

4941. Sparke Evans Park (51)

Rozalita, Sparke Evans Park, Bristol, March 2022
Rozalita, Sparke Evans Park, Bristol, March 2022

I think I know why pieces from Sparke Evans Park sometimes get left behind in my archives. As mentioned on these pages numerous times, there is a row of mature trees that run parallel with the long wall, roughly 5 meters away from it. If there is even a hint of sun, then it is impossible to photograph anything on the wall due to dappled shading – summer or winter.

Often I will photograph the wall and be dissatisfied with the pictures, and then return some time later on a dull day to take more pictures. Because of the volume of new street/graffiti being painted each week, these second sets of pictures can get a little lost in the competition for space on Natural Adventures. By looking back through my archives I can pull out a few pieces that I feel should be posted. This beauty by Rozalita is one such piece.

Rozalita, Sparke Evans Park, Bristol, March 2022
Rozalita, Sparke Evans Park, Bristol, March 2022

Although last year was a relatively quiet year for Rozalita, compared to 2021, the quality of her work was outstanding, and this gorgeous piece combines her skills at painting portraits with her detailed flowers and butterfly. I am looking forward to another great year from Rozalita.