Bees are very much the central focus of this Upfest piece by That Bloke Wilson, a self-taught artist who has been drawing all his life. He has been part of the Birmingham street art scene for a few years and has appeared at several local events there.
I’m not too sure what the story is that’s going on in this piece, but that is one big fat bee making off with the pot of nectar.
This colourful piece is by a graffiti artist turned tattooist, Cize one. An artist for more than thirty years, Cize one has produced an accomplished piece here. Having read that he designs tattoos, one can see that he pays a lot of attention to detail, and has clear lines which are filled with colour. It is an unusual, almost comic-book style that he uses. Very nice.
An unusual and rather unsettling piece from ‘1743’. Ambulances and crows are perhaps not the bringers of joy, and this is a hard-hitting piece, in spite of its small size.
The Upfest programme biography reads:
‘UK artist based in Leeds. I paint stuff because I can and it’s fun. Mostly with a spray can and stencils. Inspired by life and what I see around me.’
I don’t know a great deal about this artist, but her name is Brooke Ashley. This is a really engaging piece that I feel would lend itself well to illustration, and I would guess that her background may be in illustration.
One of the more modest pieces from the festival, but beautiful none the less.
This is a really interesting piece by the Dutch street artist Pronk-Stukken, not only for its unusual and captivating subject, but also because it was sprayed at Dean Lane skate park, which is not an official site for Upfest artists, and one that gets sprayed numerous times over during Upfest. My guess is that he had another piece somewhere at the frstival, which I don’t appear to have photographed.
This piece reminds me of a camel, but that is just what I see. I loved this piece the first time I saw it, and still like it now. One of my favourites of the festival. Regrettably it looks like Pronk-Stukken will not be returning this year.
I love stencils and I love cats…this then is simply heaven. The work is from the self-taught Bizzy (Izolda Lautner) who turned he hand to artwork only some 5-6 years ago. Without any formal training, she gives great hope for street art wannabes (like me?).
This was her first piece in front of a live audience, and I think it turned out fantastically well. I wish I had seen her in the process of spraying it. I will be keeping an eye out for her work, although it looks like she won’t be at Upfest 2017, which is a great shame. You can read more about her on her Stencil Art Prize website profile.
When blogging about street art, one increasingly becomes reliant on others for information about artists or new pieces and so on. I am grateful to ‘The Art Blogger 54’ for posting this piece recently. Until then, this photograph had been sitting in my pending file, waiting for the artist’s identity. I hadn’t seen the finished piece at Upfest, and so had no signature to go on. I cannot recommend highly enough The Art Blogger 54’s blog, especially if you are into wildlife art and sculpture.
It is by FreshMess, a collaboration between two artists, one of whose style is clean and fresh and the other whose style is erratic and messy. These two have combined beautifully to produce one of the most striking pieces of Upfest 2016.
Unfortunately, I don’t think they will be at Upfest 2017, but maybe they’ll visit again another time.
I have just been reading Skor85’s biography on the Upfest 2017 website and found out that she is of Polish origination, adding to the vibrant Polish street art community that appears to be growing in Bristol.
This is an interesting piece, from one of her favourite spots at Deaners, from July last year, around the time of Upfest. Some philosophy to go with the solemn figure drowning his/her sorrows. I love her use of colour and highlight lines on the head, arms and legs. Subtle and modest, her work always interests me.
I took this picture way back in June 2016 before I knew who it was by. I liked it at the time – I don’t photograph everything I see, and many pieces don’t make it into this blog…I have a little bit of editorial control. It is of course by Hire, and shows his trademark jagged Gothic form.
There is a symmetry to this piece, and if you look closely, you will be able to make out the letters HIRE. Nice one.
This is an old one going back a year, but what a great piece to be able to pull out of the archives. It s a stunning piece of writing from Epok, with all the things we expect from him, strong lines and sharp angles merging with round edges and curves. A geometric style that is pretty unique to Epok.
I dug this out, because I am trying to finish the Upfest 2016 posts before Upfest 2017 at the end of this month. This particular work was sitting in my folders from 2016 which I have been trawling through and screamed out at me…’publish me’.
There are other oldies to follow. I can only guess that I didn’t publish this before, because I always have way more material than I can possibly post about on two posts a day.
Natural adventures 