Results matching “paint”

I visited Brick Lane this afternoon, and it was a little bit of an unexpected visit! I only had my mobile phone with me to get some photographs, so I'm disappointed that I didn't bring my camera. I was pleased to see that Cranio (Fabio Oliveiera) has been busy painting more walls around east London, as I thought he may be after he recently refreshed his blue native man on a small sliver of wall on Brick Lane, which I wrote about here. Actually, Pedley Street was busy with several new pieces of artwork going up; Masai and Horror Crew were also busy painting, and I'll be covering their work in other posts. The work was in progress, but it looks like we will see some fantastic pieces when they are finished.

Last time Cranio was in London, he painted a mural on Great Eastern Street during the World Cup as well as this same wall on Pedley Street. Unfortunately, his piece on Pedley Street did not last long at all last time. I believe that this is the third time that he's painted this wall. Previous times can be seen here and here. Based on the previous mural by Cranio and others by other artists not lasting so long on this wall, I would check it out now before it is defaced.

This time, Cranio's blue native figures find themselves surrounded by a lot of money and gold. The artist usually paints with a message, and this one looks like it is about consumerism.  

We may see more from Cranio, so let me know if you happen to find anything.

Recently, I discovered a new mural by Dan Kitchener (also known as DANK) on Sclater Street. I'm always happy to see the artist's work. I originally posted about him here. The artist lives in the UK and often paints the walls in east London. I believe that this is the first time I've seen him paint on this particular wall on Sclater Street, but I have seen him paint the car park on the same street, which is now cordoned off and will be developed on.

Nihgt street scenes are one of the artist's favourites, and the glow of the lights and reflections in the painting make the artist's work stand out.

The full-sized pieces are below.

I think the outline on the left in the image below is one of the very large semi trucks (if you're American, otherwise it's lorry if you're British).

A few weekends ago, I was in Croydon. I saw a large mural by Dan Kitchener on the side of one of the streets in central Croydon. This is a little larger than the one on Sclater Street in east London, but it's equally impressive.

One of the artist's favourite spots is actually the side of a building on Curtain Road. This wall does change fairly regularly, and it's normally a new work by the artist. Again, this is a street scene, but it features umbrellas instead of cars.

Off of Great Eastern Street is another mural with traffic.

DANK also paints on Bethnal Green Road. There's scaffolding here, and the most recent piece is a group of people carrying umbrellas and a dark-haired girl. 

Keep checking back for more work by Dan Kitchener and other street artists.

Street Artist Otto Schade has been busy earlier this year with some new artwork painted on various walls in east London. Otto Schade was born in Chile, but he currently lives in London, so there's usually new artwork from him in the city. The end of last year and beginning of this year brought some new pieces from the artist, which I've included below. For more information and images, see my post Street Art: Otto Schade. Last year's work can be seen here, and some of his work with other artists can be seen here.

The artist works in two unique styles. One style is the tape/ribbon effect, which is sometimes interlaced with text. The newest piece by Otto Schade is on Brick Lane, and it uses this style. It features a "Love Is..." red meerkat with the names of cities forming some of the ribbons.

A full-sized photograph of the image is above.

The artist second trademark style features a silhouette on a black background inside a circular shape. Orange-yellow is the most common colour of the circle, but purple is also used but is less common. The silhouettes are simple and raise a political or social message. One example is of a mother carrying a baby and a young child as seen through the viewfinder of a weapon.

Another message is a group of children shooting slingshots at helicopters. This was a popular piece as it appeared in two different locations.

A different take on the image shows children with bows and arrows, spears, and a rifle aiming at a clown/jester figure.

Earlier this year, I also captured the following pieces using the ribbon/tape effect, but this time, they look like earthworms. The following portrait was painted near Kingsland Road.

Obama graced the same space before him.

One of the most recent is a butterfly figure of a woman, which is also a popular subject of the artist. Ely's Yard is one area where a lot of his work features. 

Keep an eye out for more of Otto Schades work in London, and let me know if you see anything.

Italian street artist Hunto (originally covered in my blog post here) is no stranger to London, and he's created dozens of murals in the city. His most recent addition to London's streets is located on Sclater Street where he painted a large mural. This is a fantastic piece, created with a white background incorporating the bright and colourful characters that he's known by. 

The full-sized piece is photographed below. Hunto is a fan of Picasso and the cubist art movement, and his style is clearly inspired by both. The subject is always the brightly-coloured characters and the relationship between them.

This is a stunning addition to the area, and along with Dan Kitchener's impressive street scene piece further down the same wall, which I'll cover in a later post, it shows that Sclater Street has some promising new potential by high profile artists. I hope that trend continues.

Of course, this is not the first work by the artist this year. Earlier this year, Hunto painted the front of a shop on the corner of Brick Lane. 

The piece below appeared on Great Eastern Street, and it's titled "Hunto says let's flirt" and it depicts amorous people.

Have you seen any recent street art by Hunto? If so, let me know.

Brazilian artist Cranio, known as Fabio Oliveira, has returned to London. The artist is known for painting his blue 'native' characters. I have previously covered his work in London when he visited for the first time (covered here) and when he visited London in the middle of 2013 and collaborated with other artists, such as HIN, Mo, and Senna (covered here). His most recent visit before recently was last summer at the time of the World Cup, and he painted walls off of Brick Lane and Great Eastern Street (covered here), but they did not last long.

On Sunday, I discovered new artwork by the artist. The small sliver of wall on Brick Lane has had one of Cranio's characters on it for the past few years now, and it had lately looked like it needed a fresh coat of paint. Instead, the artist returned to paint a new one on the spot. It's a striking piece using black and bright red to look like a flame. This marks the fourth time that Cranio has refreshed this wall now.

Perhaps more pieces by Cranio will be popping up in the coming days. Let me know if you see anything.

Paul 'Don' Smith is a street artist that I've been following for awhile, and he tends to create several new pieces of artwork in the same timeframe. This year, new work from the artist started to appear from February, and I noticed some new pieces in March and in April. Mr. Smith is a stencil artist, and I've seen him at work a few times now. His work is well-known for the creation of the 'tap man banker' image, which I've covered in previous posts. For more information about the artist and some additional work, visit my pages here, here, here, and here. Additional entries with other artists can be found here and here. I'm the most proud of meeting the artist and getting the 'tap man' image in my sketchbook that I used to carry around with me when I worked in London.

A new wall has been taken over by the artist in the past couple of months. This wall contains portraits of Judy Garland, Spock, Loki, and Heath Ledger. First, we have a tribute to Judy Garland as Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz. It has yellow bricks and rube red and emerald in the background.

Spock also occupies the wall, and this was painted after the death of actor Leonard Nimoy, who played Spock in Star Trek. The background is made up of the symbol.

Heath Ledger's portrait is one of the newer ones on the wall and would have appeared between the end of March and middle of April, and it has sadly been defaced. The actor died much too young a few years ago but was most famous for his roles in Brokeback Mountain and The Dark Knight.

Paul Walker is another portrait on this wall, and this is one of the newer portraits, which has sadly been defaced with tagging. Paul Walker died in a car accident a few years ago; he was one of the actors in the Fast and Furious films. He was in the middle of filming the latest film in the franchise (Fast & Furious 7) when he died.

Another portrait on the wall is Nestorudi and Mila, and she is an artist from Sweden.

I think Mr. Smith is a fan of comic books and science fiction as it is a common theme in his artwork. Loki from The Avengers films (and Thor) makes an appearance on the wall, and the artist uses his signature to incorporate Loki's headgear.

An older piece that appears on Hanbury Street is of the Chinese girl and Blue Lady. This would have appeared at Chinese New Year. I visited London two weeks after Chinese New Year, so this did not last long at all. This is based on a painting.

One of the newest pieces that I spotted a couple of weeks ago is of Ronnie and Reggie Kray, twins from the east end of London who were involved with criminal activity. Quite a lot of east London still glamourises them.

Another new piece of street art appears on scaffolding on Rivington Street, and it features Child 44. This is a thriller novel set in the 1950s Soviet Union.

This same scaffolding also has an image of Dr. Manhattan. He is a superhero in the Watchman.

Star Lord is another comic book character.

Last but not least, Mr. Smith has freshed the colour in one of his older pieces of work. This artwork has been at the location for at least two and a half years now, and it's a piece that most people would have just walked past. Perhaps this is why the artist put some new life into the colours. The work is of Mona Lisa and a skyline of Paris, and it's located on Great Eastern Street. At the same time, he also added a new portrait above Mona Lisa. The portrait is of Bob Hoskins, a British actor who played gangsters and criminals. He was in a film called 'Mona Lisa', and he died a year ago this month, so this new piece is possibly a tribute.

Last week, street artist JimmyC painted a new mural on the corner of Brick Lane and Fashion Street. I covered JimmyC, whose real name is James Cochran, a couple of years ago when I discovered a lot of his murals in east London from that year and his high-profile Olympian portrait of Usain Bolt. You can read about him here: Street Art: JimmyC. Toward the later part of last year, he painted a few new pieces (here), and these included a portrait of a female on a wall near Shoreditch High Street (JimmyC Street Art: New Inn Yard, Brick Lane, Hackney Road).

The new mural is actually painted on the Joe's Kid cafe wall. This wall has previously been used by street artists, and JimmyC's work is a welcome addition to the area; I do hope that it remains for awhile.

The style is JimmyC's 'dot' style, which he commonly uses in his work. According to JimmyC's Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/Jimmyc.artwork), the subject of this new piece is the cafe's owner, Danni. She is three years old in the painting, and she is with her grandfather, Joe. Joe owned a cafe in the east end in the 1930s, and this is who the cafe is named after.

The piece came as a surprise to me as I was in London last Thursday evening to meet up with ex-colleagues for their leaving drinks, and I wanted to check out as much street art as possible in the short time. This diversion on Thursday highlighted many more new pieces of street art, which I will be posting in the coming days, so do keep checking back as I am very excited about posting more excellent pieces. Street artists have certainly been busy in London over the past month.

When I visited London in the middle of April, I came across new work by French artist, Thierry Noir. He was one of the first grafitti artists and started by painting his characters on the Berlin Wall. Originally, I covered his first work in London here: Thierry Noir. To my knowledge, this was his first visit to London, and he collaborated with fellow street artist Stik. Last year, the artist came back to London, and I watched new artwork appear on Rivington Street (Thierry Noir's New Murals on Rivington Street). The artist is in London again.

The shop front on Shoreditch High Street opposite BoxPark has been painted by Thierry Noir. The shutter has not been painted, but the walls on either side of it have been. 

I love the use of colour added to the streets, and the work is simple yet effective.

 Perhaps additional pieces by Thierry Noir will be appearing over the course of the next few weeks.

The wall on the corner of Brick Lane and Pedley Street finally had new street art on it when I visited the area last Thursday. Of course, the bright and colourful piece by Bicicleta Sem Freio (covered here), which appeared at the beginning of September last year, was going to be a difficult piece to beat. The new piece is a collaboration between Guido Zimmermann and Hannah Adamaszek. It features two peacocks. Hannah's is the one on the left, and Guido's is the one on the right. 

Hannah was in London for the Femme Fierce grafitti festival (covered here) in Leake Street tunnel in March, and she was one of the 150 women who contributed to the walls of the tunnel. According to her website, she saw that Guido Zimmermann was going to be in London and agreed to collaborate with him, choosing peacocks as their subject matter. Guido's work primarily focuses on animals, and he enjoys personifying them.

Unfortunately, I found the piece with a bad message across it, which I've had to edit out of the above photographs. The message read that the work was boring and belongs in a gallery. However, art is subjective and everyone has their own tastes. I felt that damaging the piece soon after it was painted was disrespectful to the artists, particularly as they wish to create artwork, let people enjoy their artwork, and to gain exposure so that they can put their talents to use. Everyone has their own tastes. Bringing art to the streets is perfect; the walls act as a gallery and it brings the artwork to as many people as possible. These days, many do not often get the chance to visit a gallery, but if they see the artwork and enjoy it, this may encourage them to make an effort to visit a gallery at some point. Adding art to the streets can also make the area more attractive by replacing a boring wall with a work of art. 

For more information about Hannah Adamsazek, look at her website: http://hannahadamaszek.com

For more information about Guido Zimmermann, look at his website: http://globalstreetart.com/gz

En Masse is a group of street artists from Montreal. Their name means 'all together' in French, and the group was founded by Tim Barnard and Jason Botkin in 2009. It is now under direction from Botkin and Rupert Bottenberg, and the group are active in the world of art and not limited to producing art on the streets. According to their website (1), the group strives to produce collaborative artwork that creates a collective style and vision which enables enhanced creativity from the group, and they've worked with over 250 other artists internationally.

The group visited London and spent the last week painting the Village Underground mural. The result is a strking black and white mural with many different faces and other imagery. When I visited it on Sunday morning, an artist was completing the final touches on the far right-hand corner of the wall. Some detailed photographs of some of the faces that I found impressive are below.

The work actually reminded me a little bit of Amara Por Dios' work at the beginning of the year, which I covered here: Amara Por Dios: Village Underground. She also used black and white to convey several abstract faces. I am unsure if En Masse would have seen her work prior to creating theirs, but it's a great piece and a piece that I want to spend time to look at in order to see all of the different faces.

For more information about En Masse, view their Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/enmasse

1) En Masse. http://enmasse.info/about/ [12 April 2015].