Rowdy, Ryder, Taboo, Sage and Solar, Coronation Road, Bristol, January 2025
I photographed this building way back in January, but never got round to posting it. I am doing so now, because there was a large fire at the site, a former metalworks, in early October. The building ceased to be in use in 2020, and became an obvious opportunity for graffiti, and several writers from around the city duly obliged. I don’t believe that this was any kind of overall collaboration, more an accumulation of pieces over time from Rowdy, Ryder, Taboo, Sage, Solar, and one other.
Rowdy, Ryder, Taboo, Sage and Solar, Coronation Road, Bristol, January 2025
The top row (the former canteen of the building and most severely fire-damaged part – arson, by the way) is a combination collaboration from Ryder and Rowdy, both of whom are significant players on the graffiti scene in Bristol. Taboo’s dominant epic piece takes up the whole of the middle floor, and some smaller pieces from Sage, Solar (PLB) and Phase (?) occupy the ground floor. This is more of an interesting mosaic than anything else really – iconic in its own way, but now alas, ashes.
I simply cannot fathom why it has taken me so long to post this outstanding piece by Kid Krishna in Stokes Croft, painted alongside ESKA and Hemper. It has been around since April this year, and I photographed it shortly after it was painted. These pictures are more recent, and the piece is still in great condition, looking very fresh.
Kid Krishna, Stokes Croft, Bristol, October 2025
The combination piece combines his CRIE letters to the right with a group of surreal cartoon-style characters, showcasing Kid Krishna’s extraordinary talent. There is a lot of colour and movement in the piece, especially the three characters on the left who appear to be having an animated conversation.
Kid Krishna, Stokes Croft, Bristol, October 2025
Kid Krishna is something of an enigma. He is incredibly modest about his work, has unquestionable talent, paints high-end pieces and scruffy mega-tags. I think that the overriding sense I get from him and his work is the sheer love of art and creativity. Imagination and creativity are things he has in abundance, as you can see from this awesome piece.
Sled One, Oust and Stivs Brunel Way, Bristol, October 2025
I came across this outstanding collaboration, intending to photograph its predecessor by Dibz and Fade who I had watched painting their collaboration, but as I have said, you snooze, you lose in this game and when I returned it had been painted over by this masterpiece. I think that this is probably my favourite collaboration of the year so far, oozing with talent.
Sled One, Brunel Way, Bristol, October 2025
To the left, Sled One has painted one of his magnificent cartoon-style creations, heavily loaded with political commentary. The piece is reflecting the rather unsettling rise of the appropriation of the St George Cross to represent anti-immigration (and for some, racist) sentiments, purporting to be patriotism. This is another division stoked up by the right wing parties, Reform and the Conservatives, as a wedge issue from which they expect to benefit.
Anti-immigration and racist sentiments are not particularly well-supported in Bristol, and Sled One has illustrated a large shoe squashing a gammon (“gammon” is a derogatory slang term for middle-aged, often ruddy-faced, white men who are perceived as being nationalistic, anti-immigrant, and particularly supportive of Brexit) attempting to paint a St George cross on the sole of the shoe. He is being squished. If only it was that simple to moderate this rise in anti-foreigner narrative masquerading as patriotism.
Oust, Brunel Way, Bristol, October 2025
The middle section of this triptych is a superbly colourful piece of graffiti writing by Oust, spelling out OUSTER. Beautiful letters, beautiful fill colours, some nice flame bursts and bubbly background. A first-class piece of writing.
Stivs, Brunel Way, Bristol, October 2025
On the right is an outstanding cartoon portrait piece by Stivs, which I think is one of his best, and that is a high bar indeed. The stylised portrait draws on the Japanese anime genre and has so much movement and attitude about it. The piece is beautifully executed and looks like it could be a still from a film.
Stivs, Brunel Way, Bristol, October 2025
As I said before, an outstanding collaboration. Bravo! Sled One, Oust and Stivs.
As if I didn’t have enough complimentary words for Hypo in my last post of his work, I guess I’ll be heaping on some more here, simply because his efforts at the moment are at such a high level. Hypo also seems to be at the heart of the Bristol street art scene currently, and last weekend was heavily involved in a 50th birthday celebration paint jam here in the tunnel for Minto.
Hypo, St Werburghs, Bristol, October 2025
This piece, in wonderful flame colours, mirrors some of his other recent pieces, including the letter shapes and the decorative spheres. There is so much to like about this piece as his constant development continues.
Zinso’s return to painting walls in Bristol has been nothing short of heroic. His writing is always technically beautifully worked, with tight lines and well considered fills. He manages to present clean and crisp graffiti writing every time he ventures out.
Zinso, Dean Lane, Bristol, October 2025
In this piece his letters ZINSO are painted with horizontal layers of colour fills, nicely blended, running from dark green to yellow. The thought that has gone into the background is as thorough as the letters themselves, and as a whole the presentation is excellent. Zinso is both productive and tidy.
It is always a rather pleasant surprise to find a Donz piece in town because he tends to enjoy painting in his ‘manor’ of L Dub (Lawrence Weston), to the north of the city. Something you can predict quite safely is that anything by Donz is going to be colourful and bright.
Donz, St Werburghs, Bristol, October 2025
First up, the white wall works really well with his colourful design, which could get lost without it. His letters DONZ are beautifully framed within a consistent solid black border and some fine black highlights and details. The pastel colours are nicely distributed as fills throughout. All in all, a great piece from Donz.
Miso, Zase and Real143, Dean Lane, Bristol, September 2025
For a short period in September, we were privileged to see a few pieces from Zase, a well known Bristol street artist, painting alongside what I assume were friends who were visiting. It would seem that it took the enthusiasm of these friends to encourage Zase to his some walls – good news indeed. This is a collaborative wall on the side of the swimming pool at Dean Lane by Miso, Zase and Real 143.
Miso, Dean Lane, Bristol, September 2025
First up, and setting the tone with an unusual colour scheme, is this rather nice blocky piece by Miso. The piece cleverly plays with light and shade, giving the impression that the upper half is in shadow, which it isn’t. The effect is accentuated by darker shades on the upper half, and bright highlights glowing like lights. Playful stuff.
Zase, Dean Lane, Bristol, September 2025
In the middle Zase has written out his name in his anamorphic style, playing tricks with the eyes, creating an extraordinary three-dimensional effect. Again, the use of light and shade helps to create this illusion.
Real143, Dean Lane, Bristol, September 2025
To the right, and continuing the colour scheme, is another anamorphic piece, this time by Real143, and adopting a quite different overall style. This piece is much softer, with flowing rounded lines that together build an object with depth running deep into the wall. All three pieces play tricks with our eyes and this is a very special collaboration indeed.
There is not a lot more I can say about Hypo that I haven’t said in numerous previous posts. He has upped his game considerably over the last two years or so, both in terms of quality and quantity of pieces. During that time he has jumped up a couple of levels, which you can see if you take a glance at this revised gallery of his work.
Hypo, M32 roundabout, Bristol, September 2025
In this piece, Hypo uses loads of colours, indicating that it could be a ‘dregs’ piece (one which uses up what is left in spray cans) although, Hypo typically does like to use a wide range of colours. Some of his recent pieces have incorporated small spheres for decoration, and they do a great job of adding something a little extra in this work. More magnificent graffiti writing from Hypo.
Every once in a while I find a piece of graffiti or street art and I say to myself, ‘I really like that’. This is one of those pieces. It is by a graffiti writer I haven’t come across before, Rusta, and I am guessing that they were visiting Bristol and took the opportunity to have a little paint.
Rusta, Cumberland Basin, Bristol, October 2025
I love the big fat letters and rather sketchy style of the piece, and I also like the way it has been painted on a clean white buffed background to help it make its mark. The colour selection is great and the way the colours blend and jump about is rather cool. The little pink shock lines through the piece give it that little something extra. A very nice piece indeed.
It is not often that I post Halloween pieces in time for the festival, but fortunately this one by Rowzgraff was painted a little while ago and has made it through my pipeline process just in time. I am not familiar with the artist, who I believe was painting alongside Lis and Ozuk.s in a mini paint jam on the swimming pool wall in Dean Lane.
Rowzgraff, Dean Lane, Bristol, October 2025
The Halloween piece is nicely worked with the letters ROWZ incorporating a happy pumpkin and a wizard’s hat. The whole piece is set on a starry night sky – just the thing to get you into the mood for tomorrow night. There will be more Halloween pieces to share, but they won’t feature here for a little while, such is the backlog.
Natural adventures 