Tag Archives: Street Art

London, Shoreditch, street art, street artists, street art tour, Shoreditch street art tour, Brazil, Argentina, Memi Martinez, Veracidade, Reveracidade, Mauro, spraypaint, umbrella

Latin Weather – Latin Street Art

England is experiencing a temporary geo-psyche shift; our footballers think they are Brazil and our weather thinks we are Los Angeles and for the time being we have almost no need for weather forecasts.  This past week Memi Martinez and Veracidade, two street artists from far sunnier countries have made London their temporary home bringing a Latin heatwave of their own.

I don’t know if their presence at the same time is coincidence but any excuse will do to post this picture capturing two international artists in action on opposite sides of the same property.

Memi Martinez is from Argentina and over three days painted a colour scorched surreal cartoon of one three legged being pouring tea into an umbrella masquerading as a teacup held by a mirror image plump thighed “thing”.  It’s about Brits initially spurning umbrellas as an effete French fad before eventually adopting them so ubiquitously that they became almost as British as that other great tradition we appropriated from another culture: a cup of tea.

We had the opportunity several times over three days to bump into this charming visitor and all who came across Memi were overwhelmed by her bright spirit and her generosity, here we see a group of international students from the USA over for a semester excitedly showing off some stickers Memi kindly gave them.

Memi’s stickers

Memi made a small video clip of this group and it appeared on her Instagram as a “story”, lovely to see who pleased the character on the passing truck is with the artist interacting with her new fans.

Memi in action:

Memi worked for three days on this single mural and when you look closely at the solidity of the limbs and the beautiful graduation of the shading on the inside and outside of the cup clearly her meticulous approach paid off.

London, Shoreditch, street art, street artists, street art tour, Shoreditch street art tour, Brazil, Argentina, Memi Martinez, Veracidade, Reveracidade, Mauro, spraypaint, umbrella, Panoramic view, Great Eastern St

Meni Martinez detail

Veracidade aka Mauro from Brazil paints portraits and drops images of houses as a tag.  First sighting was last weekend, a “quick thing” down Brick Lane.

Then a couple more paintings all featuring people raising their eyes to the skies appeared.

Veracidade, also featuring Brazilian artist Milo Tchais (detail of)

Both the artworks above feature a stylised house in the image, Mauro totes his painting gear around in these fabulous pvc bags in the style of the houses that he uses as his tag.

 

This piece is opposite the Pure Evil Gallery and features a lovely “hat tip” to Pure Evil’s “nightmare” series with the long tear running down the face

Two Veracidade artworks, a bag and the artist!

Here are a few of those Veracidade tags that have sprung up around Shoreditch:

Veracidade – also featuring Glor Mowcodelico

Now, I must dash, something about the heat and the colours Memi has brought to London has left me with a craving for a Harvey Wallbanger.

LINKS:

Memi Martinez Instagram

Vercidade Instagram

All photos: Dave Stuart

Street Art, Shoreditch, London, Graffiti, Tours, Meeting Of Styles UK 2018, Nomadic Community Gardens, Jim Vision, Xenz, Fanakapan, Voyder, Kaes, Core, Irony, Samer, Aches, Woskerski, Carleen De Sozer, Candie Bandita, Minto, Tom Blackford

Meeting Of Styles 2018

At the end of May there is a Bank Holiday in the UK and a couple of weekends ago this provided a marvellous opportunity for a huge array of spraypainting talent to gather in Shoreditch for a frenzy of graffiti and art at the Meeting Of Styles Festival.  Since that date a load of the artists who participated in the meeting Of Styles have been mentioned on the Shoreditch Street Art Tour.

Street Art, Shoreditch, London, Graffiti, Tours, Meeting Of Styles UK 2018, Nomadic Community Gardens, Jim Vision, Xenz, Fanakapan, Voyder, Kaes, Core, Irony, Samer, Aches, Woskerski, Carleen De Sozer, Candie Bandita, Minto, Tom Blackford

Dan Kitchener Meeting Of Styles UK 2018

Meeting Of Styles is an international series of festivals which takes place in multiple locations around the world each year, this year 11 events are scheduled spread across the far east, South Africa and 6 cities in Europe.  Since 2014 the London edition of MoS has found a home in the extraordinary Nomadic Community Gardens in Shoreditch.

Street Art, Shoreditch, London, Graffiti, Tours, Meeting Of Styles UK 2018, Nomadic Community Gardens, Jim Vision, Xenz, Fanakapan, Voyder, Kaes, Core, Irony, Samer, Aches, Woskerski, Carleen De Sozer, Candie Bandita, Minto, Tom Blackford

Nomadic Community Gardens

Here are a few of the highlights of this amazing festival of art and music.

Street Art, Shoreditch, London, Graffiti, Tours, Meeting Of Styles UK 2018, Nomadic Community Gardens, Jim Vision, Xenz, Fanakapan, Voyder, Kaes, Core, Irony, Samer, Aches, Woskerski, Carleen De Sozer, Candie Bandita, Minto, Tom Blackford

Nomad Clan Meeting Of Styles UK 2018

Street Art, Shoreditch, London, Graffiti, Tours, Meeting Of Styles UK 2018, Nomadic Community Gardens, Jim Vision, Xenz, Fanakapan, Voyder, Kaes, Core, Irony, Samer, Aches, Woskerski, Carleen De Sozer, Candie Bandita, Minto, Tom Blackford

Xenz Meeting Of Styles UK 2018

On the Graffoto blog we have done a longer set of highlights which includes some of the history of the London meeting of Styles festival and a look at the development of the Nomadic Community gardens which has become a thriving vital community space in Shoreditch.

Graffoto Blog Post

All photos: Dave Stuart

 

I Don’t Like Cricket – I LUVITAAAAAAH

It is not often that cricket and street art meet but that did happen today in the home of street art, Brick Lane, Shoreditch when a small but perfectly formed group from the Shoreditch Street Art Tour came across the Cricket World Cup being displayed on Brick Lane.

Shoreditch, Street art, cricket, London, graffiti life, world cup, tour group

ICC Cricket World Cup meets Shoreditch Street Art Tours Group

The gentleman holding the trophy on behalf of the ICC confirmed that he was English (albeit not a cricketer), let’s hope this is not the only pair of English hands to be placed on that trophy next year.

Shoreditch, Street art, cricket, London, graffiti life, world cup, tour group

Mine!

The other street art connection is that a huge mural welcoming the World Cup to the home of cricket appeared on Brick Lane last night painted by the professional spraycan artists Graffiti Life – good job guys!

Shoreditch, Street art, cricket, London, graffiti life, world cup, tour group

It’s Britain; all welcome (photo Chris Howell)

 

Photos: Chris Howell (featured image and where noted above) and Dave Stuart (using Chris Howell’s camera cos he forgot his own phone this morning!)

Shoreditch, London, Street art, Street artist, tour, Ben Wilson, Chewing Gum Man, Jean Peut etre, Jonesy, Howl Owl, Keef, JXC, Travel Mag

Summer Is Here – Oops Maybe Not

Sitting at my keyboard, fresh in from a perma-drizzle that looks set for the day it is a little difficult to remember that London has had two” Summers” already this year.  Twice, barely a fortnight apart, we enjoyed temperatures over 25 degrees and boy did the street artists love that!  Lots of new street art has been appearing daily so here is a little update of some of the fresh street art that has caught our eye over the past fortnight.   At the top of the page, Shok-1 produced another of his superb X-Ray images.

Ben Wilson aka Chewing Gum Man has been particularly prolific just recently in Shoreditch and he delighted me with the story behind the two characters featured in a new chewing gum pic outside the Bricklayers Arms.  Two deliverymen, Lee and Bryan were hefting barrels up from the pub cellar, Ben had a chat with them and concluded, as recorded on the chewing gum, that Lee and Bryan should be paid more!

Shoreditch, London, Street art, Street artist, tour, Ben Wilson, Chewing Gum Man, Jean Peut etre, Jonesy, Howl Owl, Keef, JXC, Travel Mag

Lee and Bryan, Draymen, by Ben Wilson

Shoreditch, London, Street art, Street artist, tour, Ben Wilson, Chewing Gum Man, Jean Peut etre, Jonesy, Howl Owl, Keef, JXC, Travel Mag

Ben Wilson explains …

Not far away from that spot is another one of those chewing gum pics where Ben paints the view, no prizes for recognising Rivington Street:

Shoreditch, London, Street art, Street artist, tour, Ben Wilson, Chewing Gum Man, Jean Peut etre, Jonesy, Howl Owl, Keef, JXC, Travel Mag

Rivington St Chewing Gum Art by Ben Wilson

Shoreditch, London, Street art, Street artist, tour, Ben Wilson, Chewing Gum Man, Jean Peut etre, Jonesy, Howl Owl, Keef, JXC, Travel Mag

Rivington Street

Last week Jean Peut Etre caused much excitement when he was spied by a tour group collaging his pasted images and letterpress prints in several Shoreditch locations seeming always just a few moments ahead of the group.

Shoreditch, London, Street art, Street artist, tour, Ben Wilson, Chewing Gum Man, Jean Peut etre, Jonesy, Howl Owl, Keef, JXC, Travel Mag

Jean Peut Etre Collage

One of the greatest pleasures a fan of street art can enjoy is to discover an unexpected piece by a favourite artist and this came to pass the other day.  Wandering around Shoreditch on a so-called day off, armed with a proper camera photographing loads of great street art the other day I spotted a fantastic new Jonesy I had not noticed before, an absolutely stunning cast bronze piece.  The casting shows what appears to be a vulture nestling in a roundel of blasted twigs, themselves surreally mounted on the leg of a bird.

Shoreditch, London, Street art, Street artist, tour, Jonesy, bronze casting, sculpture

Jonesy

A subsequent peek on Jonesy’s facebook account revealed that this had actually been in situ since last September, a full 7 months ago.  Just goes to show that even when your eye is constantly scanning high and low for new visual disruptions it is always possible to overlook the beauty hiding in plain sight on the streets.  This next bronze casting, believed to be more recent was something I was specifically hunting for.

Jonesy

Howl Owl is a regular visitor to these shores and the cute little owls are packed with personality and get up to all kinds of mischief.   A veritable parliament of owls came to roost in Shoreditch this week and this particular group set up a sub committee with a clowder of Keef’s cats on a stinky sewage pipe, looking like they contemplating setting off in a pea green boat.

Shoreditch, London, Street art, Street artist, tour,Howl Owl, Keef

Howl Owl and Keef collaboration

We mustn’t forget that some street art is done with permission, the weekend before last JXC painted this quality image of Judge Dredd taking out Mickey!

Shoreditch, London, Street art, Street artist, tour, Ben Wilson, Chewing Gum Man, Jean Peut etre, Jonesy, Howl Owl, Keef, JXC, Travel Mag

Mickey Mouse justice Judge Dredd style

Finally, it was lovely to receive a link to an article on the Travel Mag online where they select their 7 favourite walking tours in London and kindly featured Shoreditch Street Art Tours, we are honoured and thank them, check out the best in London here.

LINKS

Shok-1 Instagram

Jean Peut-Etre Instagram

Jonesy Facebook

Howl Owl Instagram

Sad Keef Instagram

JXC Instagram

all photos: Dave Stuart

 

 

 

Shoreditch, London, Airborne Mark, The Pilot, Street Art, Graffiti, origami, origami riots, maquette,

New Origami Street Art In Shoreditch By Airborne Mark

Street Artist, rapper and origami guru Airborne Mark returned to Brick Lane a couple of weeks ago to paint a new origami mask inspired mural, which was a pleasant surprise for the Shoreditch Street Art Tours group who stumbled across the artist at work.

Shoreditch, London, Airborne Mark, The Pilot, Street Art, origami, origami riots, maquette,

Work In Progress April 2018

Airborne Mark was using a folder paper origami model as the reference for the painting and we have often seen Airborne Mark using his own origami models.  Airborne Mark, who is always very pleasant and happy to have a little chat with the tour, told us that this wasn’t his piece of origami, it was sent to him from Sweden by master origami mask maker Flynn Jackson,.

Shoreditch, London, Airborne Mark, The Pilot, Street Art, Graffiti, origami, origami riots, maquette,

Maquette – Flynn jackson

You can see what a stunning realistic painted interpretation of the actual model airborne Mark produced.

Shoreditch, London, Airborne Mark, The Pilot, Street Art, Graffiti, origami, origami riots, maquette,

Airborne Mark vs Flynn Jackson

Airborne Mark has produced a really cool video of both receiving the model through the post and the work in progress painting at the wall.  Blink and you’ll miss it but there is even a subliminal glimpse at about 5.05 of our tour group admiring Airborne Mark at work.

Here is a little selection of other occasions we have seen Airborne Mark painting from his own origami masks as well as a few shots of other Airborne Mark masterpieces put up over the years.

Shoreditch, London, Airborne Mark, The Pilot, Street Art, Graffiti, origami, origami riots,

Airborne Mark (crouching in shot), Massai, Dan Kitchener, Jimmy C 2012

Shoreditch, London, Airborne Mark, The Pilot, Street Art, Graffiti, origami, origami riots, maquette,

Airborne Mark Origami Riots 2014

Shoreditch, London, Airborne Mark, The Pilot, Street Art, Graffiti, origami, origami riots,

Van Painting – Meeting Of Styles 2015

Shoreditch, London, Airborne Mark, The Pilot, Street Art, Graffiti, origami, origami riots, maquette,

Work In Progress March 2017

Shoreditch, London, Airborne Mark, The Pilot, Street Art, Graffiti, origami, origami riots

Greek Mask work in progress 2017

A tiny smidge of background: Airborne Mark moved to the UK in 2005 and had a graffiti pedigree, he used to write the name Pilot before switching to the still aviation related street art moniker Airborne Mark, here are a couple of his older graffiti pieces in Hackney Wick and Leake street, both from early 2009.

Shoreditch, London, Airborne Mark, The Pilot, Street Art, Graffiti, origami, origami riots

The Pilot, Leake Street 2009

Shoreditch, London, Airborne Mark, The Pilot, Street Art, Graffiti, origami, origami riots

The Pilot, Hackney Wick 2009

Links:

Airborne Mark: website

all photos: Dave Stuart

video courtesy Airborne Mark

Shoreditch – More Than Street Art Apparently

Shoreditch is our stomping ground and street art is our passion but it is good to be reminded that when you have finished your street art tour there are so many other things to see and do in Shoreditch.  Our recent guest Lizzie has written a wonderful blog post “So You Think You Know London? – Brick Lane” which reveals Shoreditch in its broader context for visitors.

Photo by Lizzie on the Shoreditch Street Art Tour

Have a read of Lizzie’s words for some great suggestions for post tour possibilities.

I know the feature photo at the top of the page looks like a photo of a car but it is actually a snap I snatched during the actual tour Lizzie was on last weekend.

 

Half Term – No Half Measures

Spring half term holiday has just finished in the UK and Shoreditch Street Art tours was busy.  On Monday as a group admired the work in the car park behind the old Seven Stars Pub a car screeched into the yard and, like some kind of artist tardis, a dark door opened and out came a street artist and a load of working materials, Fanakapan spent the week progressing a massive dual aspect mural outside Magna on Brick Lane.

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On Saturday, our tour guest Alicia managed to get a wonderful souvenir, a Fan tag on her shoulder bag.

London, Shoreditch, Street art, street artists, school break, half term, halfterm, holidays, Broccoli Man, Adrian Boswell, Fanakapan, ThisOne, Mr Cenz

Fan of Fanakapan!

Among other artists busy creating new artworks that we had the pleasure of encountering were Mr Cenz and ThisOne.

London, Shoreditch, Street art, street artists, school break, half term, halfterm, holidays, Broccoli Man, Adrian Boswell, Fanakapan, ThisOne, Mr Cenz

Artist in The Crowd – Mr Cenz

London, Shoreditch, Street art, street artists, school break, half term, halfterm, holidays, Broccoli Man, Adrian Boswell, Fanakapan, ThisOne, Mr Cenz

Mr Cenz work in progress

London, Shoreditch, Street art, street artists, school break, half term, halfterm, holidays, Broccoli Man, Adrian Boswell, Fanakapan, ThisOne, Mr Cenz

ThisOne – freshly finished and signed

Several pieces of Free Art were found, firstly this lovely framed art drop by Sean Worral was discovered in a wall in Shoreditch.

London, Shoreditch, Street art, street artists, school break, half term, halfterm, holidays, Broccoli Man, Adrian Boswell, Fanakapan, ThisOne, Mr Cenz

#365ArtDrop 18, Free Art from Sean Worrall 16/365

London, Shoreditch, Street art, street artists, school break, half term, halfterm, holidays, Broccoli Man, Adrian Boswell, Fanakapan, ThisOne, Mr Cenz

#365ArtDrop 18 found!

Then at the end of the week, two Free Art Friday art pieces by Ninja Grl were discovered at basically the same location.

London, Shoreditch, Street art, street artists, school break, half term, halfterm, holidays, Broccoli Man, Adrian Boswell, Fanakapan, ThisOne, Mr Cenz

Free Art Friday – Ninja Grl

London, Shoreditch, Street art, street artists, school break, half term, halfterm, holidays, Broccoli Man, Adrian Boswell, Fanakapan, ThisOne, Mr Cenz

Free Art Friday – Ninja Grl

At the start of the week Adrian Boswell, the Broccoli Man, put up a new four piece broccoli rainbow installation.  As the week started chilly and as the broccoli aged, the florets started to wilt and open.  Then some strange interventions took place as the broccoli moved around like some strange game of chess was underway before being chopped into smaller pieces.

London, Shoreditch, Street art, street artists, school break, half term, halfterm, holidays, Broccoli Man, Adrian Boswell, Fanakapan, ThisOne, Mr Cenz

Maturing Broccoli – Adrian Boswell

London, Shoreditch, Street art, street artists, school break, half term, halfterm, holidays, Broccoli Man, Adrian Boswell, Fanakapan, ThisOne, Mr Cenz

Broccoli Man Adrian Boswell

London, Shoreditch, Street art, street artists, school break, half term, halfterm, holidays, Broccoli Man, Adrian Boswell, Fanakapan, ThisOne, Mr Cenz

Adrian Boswell’s Broccoli

More about the broccoli street art on this recent blog post.

Life Is Beautiful’s Dark Wings photo opportunity, covered earlier in the week HERE, gradually decayed over the week as more and more tags accumulated but guests persevered, making the best of the opportunity to photograph some nice interactions with the work.

London, Shoreditch, Street art, street artists, school break, half term, halfterm, holidays, Broccoli Man, Adrian Boswell, Fanakapan, ThisOne, Mr Cenz London, Shoreditch, Street art, street artists, school break, half term, halfterm, holidays, Broccoli Man, Adrian Boswell, Fanakapan, ThisOne, Mr Cenz

Then on Sunday morning, boom! Still smelling of fresh paint we found that the dark wings had been restored, as Life Is Beautiful noted they had nine lives.

Dark Wings, Nine Lives

Half term flew past with lots of fun and a load of great street art in Shoreditch as usual, thanks to all the guests and all the artists who make it such a wonderful week.

Links:

Fanakapan: Instagram

Mr Cenz: Website

ThisOne: Instagram

Sean Worrall: Website

Ninja Grl: Website

Adrian Boswell: Website

Life Is Beautiful: Instagram

All photos: Dave Stuart

Shoreditch, London, street art, tours, broccoli, broccoli man, Adrian Boswell

Adrian Boswell Is Shoreditch’s Broccoli Man

In early 2017, broccoli supplies in England collapsed due to a crop failure in Spain, prices soared, shops set up barricades.

Shoreditch, London, street art, tours, broccoli, broccoli man, Adrian Boswell

Broccoli Panic Spreads

A street artist made light of such woes as real broccoli started to appear in art on Shoreditch walls!

January 2017

Shoreditch, London, street art, tours, broccoli, broccoli man, Adrian Boswell

January 2017

The art consisted of real broccoli cut in half with additional collaged elements showing the face, hands and feet of a bearded gentleman.   From January 2017 on round and square mirrors Broccoli Man appeared, then from March the natural greens of the broccoli were replaced by reds.

Shoreditch, London, street art, tours, broccoli, broccoli man, Adrian Boswell Shoreditch, London, street art, tours, broccoli, broccoli man, Adrian Boswell

The placement was often amusing, such as on this huge unofficial billboard advertising a tv program about a certain recreational plant, suggesting that the programme was an in-depth feature on broccoli.

Shoreditch, London, street art, tours, broccoli, broccoli man, Adrian Boswell

Adrian Boswell, the artist behind the face in the broccoli introduced himself one morning, and in addition to being a very friendly chap who regards putting broccoli up on walls as an obvious thing to do, Adrian is also a prolific collage artist.

Hairpin – original collage

Shoreditch, London, street art, tours, broccoli, broccoli man, Adrian Boswell

Acid Rain – original collage

Adrian’s gallery is on Brick Lane at the Old Truman Brewery, just ask for Broccoli Man.

Shoreditch, London, street art, tours, broccoli, broccoli man, Adrian Boswell

Gallery, Brick lane

Adrian is a quiet spoken, industrious indeed prolific artist.  He acknowledges that his work ethic and intense bursts of activity may see him working 30 hour continuous sessions without sleep in his studio.

Shoreditch, London, street art, tours, broccoli, broccoli man, Adrian Boswell

Adrian Boswell in his Gallery

Adrian has a number of projects in the pipeline including opening a gallery abroad, taking the broccoli street art concept to another level and, of course, producing more studio art.  He is also engaged on an ambitious book project, hoping to produce a book a year for 10 years.

Shoreditch, London, street art, tours, broccoli, broccoli man, Adrian Boswell

Adrian Boswell Books

Broccoli continues to appear on the street, the broccoli has turned gold, perhaps in response to that brief period in 2017 when it became a luxury item and recently a rainbow spectrum of broccoli appeared.

Shoreditch, London, street art, tours, broccoli, broccoli man, Adrian Boswell

Golden Broccoli, Jan 2018

Shoreditch, London, street art, tours, broccoli, broccoli man, Adrian Boswell

In the most recent installations in Shoreditch, gold Broccoli Man has appeared imprisoned in a cage

Shoreditch, London, street art, tours, broccoli, broccoli man, Adrian Boswell

Caged Broccoli, Feb 2018

This blog post is based on a longer blogpost on Graffoto in which we examine the whole broccoli crisis in more depth and ponder an unexpected role for government spits in suppressing evidence of the broccoli crisis.

Link: Adrian Boswell website

All photos Dave Stuart except additional gallery photos of artwork courtesy Adrian Boswell website

Other sources: Websites of The Times, The Daily Telegraph, www.her.ie, www.bbc.co.uk