Maldito Mono is a street artist originally from the Canary Islands but who is now living in London in search of new experiences and to expand his work. His piece for Upfest is a bright and colourful bat with a bucket hat. Of course, the bat is holding a spray can, the tool of the trade.
Maldito Mono, Upfest, Bristol, July 2017
What is interesting to me about this piece is the eyes – they are vacant, and at first I wondered if the piece was complete, but the subtle shading in the eyes suggests that they are meant to be like this. I guess bats are blind, so this might be a nod to that. A nice piece.
A pairing that I have seen a number of times over the last couple of years is that of Laic217 and Cort. An interesting aspect of this is that while I have seen numerous solo Laic217 pieces, I can’t recall ever seeing solo Cort work, but maybe I’m just not seeing them.
Laic217, Dean Lane, Bristol, November 2017
This is the first piece to cover over the amazing work of Apset and Ionas from Upfest in July this year. To be honest, I am amazed it has taken so long, but finally the piece had been dogged and then covered over by this new collaboration. We see in this piece the familiar skeleton work of Laic217, this time in a monochrome red with purple accent.
Cort, Dean Lane, Bristol, November 2017
The Cort writing is great to look at and plays with a few styles and techniques. All in all this is a nice collaboration, but one which I expect to be far shorted lived than it’s predecessor.
I have known about this spot for a long while, but not managed to get out to it until recently. It is on a concrete wall which supports one of the main road bridges over the River Avon. The wall, on the south bank, is ideal for spraying, but a little less than ideal for photographing, due to poor light and reflections. I tried my best.
Inkie, Brunel Way, Bristol, November 2017
This interesting piece by Inkie is a middle section to an ASK crew Halloween collaboration. There is one part about this that I am not sure about. The character in the middle is quite unlike anything I have seen from Inkie before and at first, my suspicion was that it is by somebody else, but the more I look at it, the more I think it is Inkie’s work. The hair in particular is in the style that he uses for his other pieces.
The writing is, as you would expect to see from Inkie, immaculate, and the piece as a whole something slightly out of the ordinary. More from this wall to follow soon.
This wall in the famous Wilder Street is beautifully curated by Where the Wall and never seems to get tagged, this is probably down to the high quality of the collaborations that get permission to spray here. It is a little bit more like an outdoor gallery than graffiti wall.
Epok, Wilder Street, Bristol, November 2017
Set on a nicely prepped red brick colour, this wonderful collaboration from three members of the ASK crew, Epok, Sepr and Deamze is a graffiti/street art feast. First up is a lovely clean angular piece of wildstyle writing, so typical of Epok. His work rarely fits the ‘rectangular’ boundaries that most writers work to, with his work often smaller at one end than the other.
Sepr, Wilder Street, Bristol, November 2017
Next up is the recently invigorated Sepr, who until recently has been relatively quiet on the streets, but of late has become quite busy, which is a great thing for all of us. Sepr has a great ability to tell stories through his cartoonesque work.
Sepr, Wilder Street, Bristol, November 2017
In this piece Sepr shows, by way of a thought bubble, that the karate protagonist is using his concentration to break a plank of wood – his mind is on a tree hugging his wife/partner – he is focusing his jealousy and rage into kinetic energy…or something like that.
Deamze, Wilder Street, Bristol, November 2017
The third part of this collaboration is yet another clean and tidy piece of wildstyle writing from Deamze, once again without a character. The balance of the three pieces is perfect, and the colour selections easy on the eye and complementary. A really great wall, well worth a gander.
I knew where to look first when I emerged from the tube station in Camden Town, and on locating my first spot, I was rewarded with a small parking yard which had been pretty much resprayed since I was here a year ago. Unfortunately the gates were closed, which made photographing the side walls a little tricky, but this end wall, a gateway to an inner yard, was thankfully unobstructed and face on. The piece is of course by Stinkfish, who is also responsible for the most iconic piece in Stokes Croft, Bristol.
Stinkfish, Camden Town, London, November 2017
Stinkfish specialises in painting yellow portraits from photographs that he takes of people he meets, and adorns them with vibrant patterns of colour and light, creating a magical movement all around the piece. These characteristics make his work easy to identify.
Stinkfish, Camden Town, London, November 2017
His pieces are always great to look at and seem to ask many questions about who these characters are. I am not sure about the background, which looks like it is by another artist. In my view, the pieces fight for attention instead of complementing one another, so I would suggest that this was not a collaboration, but I am usually wrong about these things.
Anyone familiar with Bladerunner (the original) will be familiar with the Tyrell quote: ‘The light that burns twice as bright burns half as long – and you have burned so very, very brightly, Roy’.
Pegasus, Camden Town, London, November 2017
This quote could equally well be applied to the extraordinary vocalist Amy Winehouse who died of a drugs overdose in July 2011. In the UK, and especially in North London there is a terrific fondness for this amazingly talented young woman whose moment in the spotlight was so short and fragmented. This wonderful stencil, by Pegasus, is a fine tribute to the singer.
Pegasus, Camden Town, London, November 2017
I have featured a couple of Pegasus pieces in previous posts, this one of Mother Teresa from last year’s upfest, and this one of Donald Trump. Pegasus is fond of creating works of iconic public figures and is not afraid of controversy.
On a recent trip to Camden Town, I visited a few of the streets I had been to a year previously. This particular hot spot for street art was rather annoyingly obstructed by this hoarding, which rendered any photography pretty useless, along the narrow passage where the best walls are. However, it was an ill wind really, as the hoarding has become the canvass for this fine and rather haunting piece by Irony.
Irony, Camden Town, London, November 2017
I could tell, the minute I saw this portrait piece, that is was by an established and talented artist, but it wasn’t until I got home and properly looked at the pictures (and started seeing the image appearing on Instagram) that I realised it was by Irony. I am guessing that it is a reasonably new piece, and feel quite lucky to have ‘bumped into it’.
The weather, and time of day can be a real pain in the backside when taking pictures of street art. I always feel I have to take pictures, even if the light conditions are a bit crap, just in case the piece I am photographing isn’t there the next time I pass by…a very real possibility in Bristol. I am saying all this as a bit of an elaborate excuse for a rather poor picture of a beautiful recent piece by Decay.
Decay, The Bearpit, Bristol, October 2017
This Halloween piece is notable because it is one of those rare examples of Decay’s work that departs from his customary reds, greys and blacks. I really love this piece, and love the way he has ‘respectfully’ sprayed around the sign that says ‘exhibition in progress, please respect’. It made me smile. Something different and yet so familiar from Decay.
The hoarding in Raleigh Road has become a popular spot with Cheo, Soker, Voyder and Deamze in particular, and between them they keep refreshing it with some great work. This is a great piece from Cheo featuring a couple of spraying characters and his signature bee.
Cheo, Raleigh Road, Bristol, October 2017
This piece is fresh and clean, and looks as tidy as if it were still in his black book. I’m not quite certsin what the characters actually are, but they are both dressed in hoody and baseball cap respectively. Very street.
Cheo, Raleigh Road, Bristol, October 2017
So many more of his pieces in my archive…more time needed.
Thelochnessmonster specialises in these large rectangular line drawing pieces. In this case it s a white line on a blue background. There are several of the motifs that Thelochnessmonster uses in this piece, such as the yin yang icon, peace symbol and a crystal.
Thelochnessmonster, Dean Lane, Bristol, November 2017
As is often the case with this artist, there is a story going on in this picture. It would be great to get into his head a little mor and start to unpick some of his work. Another nice piece from this artist with a quite unique atyle and approach to street art.
Natural adventures 