Monthly Archives: June 2021

Some People Are On The Pitch…

Why does a street art tour guide snap adverts? The answer is simply for love of the graphic response adverts provoke. The way people subvert, augment and modify adverts is pretty much an artform in itself. The printed advert becomes a host for forced artistic collaboration and capturing the “before and after” timeline yields fascinating mini histories of public intervention.

don’t buy it, don’t buy it….

A week ago I photographed an illegal flyposter advertising a new album release, in itself it was a quite compelling photograph. When I returned from a week in Wales the advert was still there, to my surprise, though now it hosted several graffiti enhancements. The black tag with the jagged arrow underlining reads ARTIK LTB who is an hugely impressive creator of large scale rollerbrush graffiti all over London. There is also a vertical tag which could be “Sey”; the large “throw” over the three characters in the advert appears to read PY and there is an arcing “Shmokey” tag in a white marker with quote marks and triple dotted underlining.

illegal flyposter advert subverted by a graffiti writer in Shoreditch

Artik, Shmokey and others vs advertising

The next morning the Shoreditch Street Art Tour passed through this tunnel and that advert had been replaced with a fresh crop of flyposters which I dutifully snapped at high speed as we passed by. Although I am I swear completely and utterly immune to adverts, there is an advert for Ed Sheeran in that collection which is a curious coincidence as last Summer on a Shoreditch Street Art Tour we spotted Ed Sheeran serving burgers out of a silver airstream style street food truck just yards from that very spot.

illegal flyposter advert in Shoreditch June 2021

June 2021 Flyposters

Ed Sheeran serving fast food from a silver airstream truck in Shoreditch London spotted on Shoreditch Street Art Tour

Ed Sheeran padding his CV, 2020

To my delight, just 24 hours later on Sunday that collection of adverts had augmented with a gorgeous fat chrome and black dub by Noyse.

Noyze 1 Flyposters 0

So, why do people make marks on adverts? In the case of street artists, being anti advertising has been a core sentiment since the movement’s origins, for many artists it justified illegal street art created in response to desecration of the visual public landscape by overwhelming advertising.

illegal flyposter advert subverted by street artist Decapcitator in Shoreditch

Decapacitator vs Uniqlo, 2008

Graffiti writers will point to the fact that the adverts are in locations designed to attract eyeballs, they also provide a nice clean surface for easy marking. In the case of the locations photographed here they also happen to be right next to key graffiti spots and many graffiti writers just happen to be in the area with the right equipment

graffiti by sony over spraypainted advert for Breitling in Shoreditch

spraypainted watch advert subverted by Sony (ironic? lol)

Just a brief note on the title of this essay which may seem a little obscure particularly if you are not British or a football fan. There is an iconic fragment of BBC commentary from 1966 which registers as one of the nation’s most patriotic collective memories, see the short clip below; an advert is a “pitch”; people intervening on an advert are “on the pitch” and the football theme is relevant as the Euros are currently underway 1 year late.

Here is a small selection of some favourite earlier examples of advert subversion:

illegal flyposter advert subverted by street artist Anna Laurini in Shoreditch

Anna Laurini “Let’s Advertise”, 2016

illegal flyposter advert in Shoreditch in 2020

very arty advert

illegal flyposter advert subverted by street artist Nathan Bowen in Shoreditch

Bowenised

illegal flyposter advert for Lady Gaga subverted by street artist DFace in Shoreditch

D*Face vs Lady Gaga 2016

Does the advertising work? There is still no way I could be persuaded to purchase an Ed Sheeran album 🙂

LINKS:

Artik instagram

Sony instagram

Nathan Bowen instagram

Anna Laurini instagram

D*Face instagram

all photos: Dave Stuart

The Darling Street Art Buds of May

Shoreditch Street Art Highlights From May 2012

William Shakespeare is rarely the first thing we think of in street art. Shakespeare’s downer on the month of May was its tendency to be a bit windy so with the low temperatures and rain experienced in May 2021 London certainly bore some of the weather characteristics maligned by the bard in the sonnet Shall I compare Thee to A Summers Day.

The weather didn’t deter street artists and with outdoor groups of more than 6 permitted from May 17^th not to mention of course the reopening of some of our favourite watering holes there was a lot of street art activity around Shoreditch. Here are some of the highlights we found on the Shoreditch Street Art Tour:

ALO had a prolific month and the highlight was this quintet of females painted without permission at the major intersection between Old Street, Commercial Street and Shoreditch High Street. See also the featured image at the top of the post.

street artist ALO painting street art in Shoreditch

ALO work in progress

street artist ALO street art female portrait in Shoreditch

ALO, female portraits, May 2021

ALO, Moroccan Lady, May 2021

Pablo Fiasco painted some jaw dropping stencils in May, the complexity and skill of this father of street art defies belief almost. This –on-the-wall guide to selecting caps for spraycans was genius, and the word “was” is used as the piece, as ephemeral as a mayfly, has been written over.

All Caps with MF Doom tribute – Pablo Fiasco

Stencil Street Art by Pablo Fiasco behind the Old Blue Last on the Shoreditch Hoxton Border in London

MF Doom tribute – Pablo Fiasco

One of the great excitements for a street art aficionado in London is to discover a new Jonesy bronze. One of the tour groups early in May shared my joy as I spotted a brand new Jonesy I did not know existed – from the other side of the main road!

SStreet Art Bronze castsing on top of a pole by Jonesy in Shoreditch London

Jonesy bronze

Street Art Bronze casting on top of a pole by Jonesy in Shoreditch London

Jonesy bronze

Shoreditch’s main purveyor of broccoli, Adrian Boswell hit the streets hard with floret of broccoli presented as bite size angel, devil or 24 carot gold broccoli.

Broccoli street art by street artist Adrian Boswell in Shoreditch London

Adrian Boswell Angel, Devil & 24 Carot Gold Broccoli

3km of string was all it took Perspicere to make this beauty which appeared on the old Shoreditch Tube Station which is on Pedley St just off Brick Lane. String street art is comparatively rare and London based artist Perspicere is the master of the genre, in fact quite possibly the only street practitioner – yarn bombing is something different. Sadly this piece didn’t last too long as some thief went to a lot of trouble prizing it off the wall, that’s the temporary nature of street art.

Perspicere

Finally for this May street art flashback, Ed Hicks produced a spraycan art masterpiece on Great Eastern St, inspired by the apocalyptical landscapes of 19^th century painter John Martin. This truly extraordinary painting lasted about 5 weeks.

Ed Hicks

All photos: Dave Stuart

Clusters of Street Art Collaborations

As we enjoyed a rare hot late May bank holiday in the UK, the Bank holiday Monday Shoreditch Street Art Tour discovered a fascinating range of new street art that had been put up since just the day before. One curious aspect was the number of gorgeous collaborations, in fact just for fun we could link the artist combinations in a street art “degrees of separation” web of connectivity. The main image at the top of the post features Planet Selfie & Hello The Mushroom.

Hello The Mushroom & So Schoen Immer Weider

Paste up artist Hello The Mushroom, previously of London now based in Oslo, has collaborated creatively with many street artists from other countries and it was a pleasure to find eye catching art works with So.Schoen.Immer.Wieder, Planet Selfie, both of Cologne, Jens Regler from Sweden and Eraquario of Brazil.

Hello The Mushroom & Eraquario

collaborative street art in Shoreditch from Hello THe Mushroom and Jens Regler

Hello The Mushroom & Jens Regler

Planet Selfie & Hello The Mushroom

Planet Selfie in turn has a collaboration up with Dacarter

Planet Selfie & Dacarter

The above photo features also Fanakapan’s anamorphic balloon at the entrance to that alley, meanwhile also in that alley is another Planet Selfie, this time with Rad aka Raddington Falls

collaborative street art in Shoreditch from Planet Selfie and Raddington Falls

Planet Selfie and Rad aka Raddington Falls

Here for good measure is a small sample of the many collaborations that have delighted and inspired us in the past year starting with a couple of my favourite street artists, Smiler and Face The Strange.