Tag: South Street

7823. South Street – Upfest 2026 (45)

Xenz, Upfest 2026, South Street, Bristol, May 2026
Xenz, Upfest 2026, South Street, Bristol, May 2026

Xenz has absolutely smashed it with this atmospheric neoclassical vista on South Street. The piece is an absolute treat for anyone strolling along North Street and a real head-turner. The wall is a special one and Xenz has more than done it justice.

Xenz, Upfest 2026, South Street, Bristol, May 2026
Xenz, Upfest 2026, South Street, Bristol, May 2026

It is interesting to see the changes that Xenz made to his largely complete piece when I passed by while he was painting, such as the lily pads and rocks in the water, and some white flowers on the creepers to the left. As you can imagine from the amount of intricate detail in his work, this piece took more than a couple of days to complete.

Xenz, Upfest 2026, South Street, Bristol, May 2026
Xenz, Upfest 2026, South Street, Bristol, May 2026

Xenz’ fantasy work allows the mind to drift into another world where calmness and peace are at the heart of everything. This is definitely a personal favourite from this year’s festival.

2399. South Street

This summer has been so very busy for street art in Bristol and I am really struggling to keep up with it all. For every piece that I write about in these posts there are at least another seven or eight that never make it out of my archives, and all of this without the hunderds of pieces I would normally be writing about from Upfest at this time of year. All this means that I have an inevitable backlog.

L7M and Paul Monsters, South Street, Bristol, July 2019
L7M and Paul Monsters, South Street, Bristol, July 2019

This not-so-recent collaboration is yet another extraordinary piece to have been organised by Upfest for their Summer Editions event. Who’d have thought of bringing together L7M and Paul Monsters? But here they are working together with their hugely contrasting styles.

L7M and Paul Monsters, South Street, Bristol, July 2019
L7M and Paul Monsters, South Street, Bristol, July 2019

The centrepiece by L7M is a delicately, wispily painted finch (I’m not sure which species) full of movement and colour, a skilful mixture of fine detail and blurry ‘smoke’. His work is truly exceptional and we have been lucky in Bristol to see quite a bit of it in this area thanks to Upfest.

The geometric surround is the work of Paul Monsters and is typical of his 3D blockwork, but notably different from anything I have seen from him before in that it is black, white and grey, when I normally associate his work with oranges, greens, browns, yellows and mauves. The whole thing makes for a clever juxtaposition which challenges the norm. Great collaboration.