Results matching “paint”

On the 15th of March, I headed over to the Leake Street tunnel to see the grafitti. Despite using Waterloo Station daily for the past few years, this was my first visit to Leake Street. I knew that the event 'Femme Fierce' had kicked off the previous weekend, so I was keen to see some of the artwork produced. 

'Femme Fierce' is an event held by female grafitti/street artists each year. The event is inspired by International Women's Day and the charity supported is Plan UK's 'Because I am a Girl' campaign. It promises to end child marriage and slavery as well as to provide more rights for girls. More information can be found here: http://www.plan-uk.org/because-i-am-a-girl/

The walls in the tunnel were painted blue during the event, and several female artists took part. Over 150 pieces of artwork were created for the event. Artists include Zabou, Amara Por Dios, Artista, Simoni Fontana, Franie Strand, and Kaleidoscope Eyes.

By the time that I visited, several of the good pieces that I had seen in photographs had been painted over. Artwork in the Leake Street tunnel is always changing and does not last long at all. The work here changes more frequently than the walls in east London. However, I did get several photographs, which you can see below.

I'm not sure if the Lego 'Letgo' one above is actually part of the Femme Fierce, but I liked it, and it is dated this year.

More photographs can be seen on InspiringCity's blog at: http://inspiringcity.com/2015/03/14/femme-fierce-2015-packs-the-leake-street-tunnel-as-female-street-artists-paint-it-brilliant-blue/

In addition, check out the event's Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/FemmeFierceEvents

Over the past few months, I discovered some new and older street art little pig sculptures by artist Love Piepenbrinck around London. These are always unexpected and bring a smile to my face. One cute one is a pig-tiger lurking in a corner near Spitalfields. More photographs of the artist's work can be seen in my entry: Street Art: Love Piepenbrinck - Jenikya's Blog

I was very pleased to discover the location of the piggie advent calendar from Christmas 2013. I thought that I knew the location when I saw the photographs appearing on the artist's Facebook page, but I was incorrect and I only discovered the actual location last spring. Unfortunately, only a few of the 24 pigs remained. And there is one less now as I discovered one of them was lying on the groud and looking very sad so I took it to my desk at work to look after (after receiving permission from the artist). Perhaps I can get some glue from somewhere and paste it back up on the streets for others to enjoy.

Sometimes I just discover a new one when I am not expecting it, such as the one covered in fabric balls. Other times, it takes a new piece of artwork to paint around the pig in order for me to see it, such as the old flowery one.

I published the following in another enty, and I was lucky to capture them before they were too weathered and/or stolen. It seems that a lot of these get stolen because I see them posted by other street art enthusiasts and recognise the location, but before I am able to snap my own photograph, they have gone walkabout. My favourite has to be the patchwork one below.

Have you spotted any of these around London's streets?

Easter Sunday in North Yorkshire was beautiful and warm, and after we had our Easter lunch at the Guy Fawkes Arms, the bloke and I drove down the road to visit Fountains Abbey and Studley Royal Water Garden. The attractions are a UNESCO World Heritage site and are set over a couple hundred acres of land. I am unsure if the photographs do the attraction justice as it's really a beautiful place, and it would look attractive in any season.

We arrived in the early afternoon, and the parking was nearly full and the grounds were busy with families with young children. The attraction was hosting an Easter Egg trail for the children, so this was popular but not quite as popular as the previous afternoon when we visited Brimham Rocks.

On our walk through the fields to Fountains Abbey, we saw a pheasant. Actually, these pheasants were everywhere on the grounds. We did watch a fight between two male pheasants later in the day.

We arrived with a view of the scale of Fountains Abbey, which was actually a lot larger than I expected. The abbey is one of the largest and best-preserved Cisterian monestaries in England. It ws founded in 1132 by thirteen months who had been expelled at St. Mary's Abbey in York after a disagreement, and they were provided with the land along the river at the present site of Fountains Abbey ruins. On this site, they successfully created the wealthiest monestary of its time.

The monestary became ruins after Henry VIII's Dissolution of Monestaries after his disagreements with the Pope over his seeking of a divorce from his first wife, Catherine of Aragon from Spain. Catholicism ended in England at that point, and Henry VIII got his divorce and married Anne Boleyn.

I hope that the photographs of the ruins of Fountains Abbey give some indication of the scale and grandeur of this monestary.

Great Cloisters

Cloisters courtyard (interior)

Frater house (original floor tiles)

Doorway

Sculpture

View of tower and Chapter House

Nave

After having a quick look around Fountains Abbey, we walked out the other side to walk through the park/gardens. We wanted to visit St. Mary's Church, a church built in the late 1800s, before it shut at 4:00. A trail can be followed around the lake/river to the water gardens and deer park. The part of the trail that we followed went around the river/lake area in a clockwise fashion.

We saw views over the Studley Royal Water Gardens below us at one point on the trail, and the trail followed the main stretch of the water gardens to the end. 

We had to exit the grounds to get to the deer park and St. Mary's Church. St. Mary's Church is located inside the deer park. We did not see any deer, and I assume that they must be hiding or sleeping further afield than we walked. 

Deer park

The church finally came into view, and we went inside and took some photographs. The organ was being played, and they were letting children have a turn at ringing the church bell. This is a gothic-style church from the late 1800s.

I loved the stained glass windows and the way that the light shone through them, and the ceiling was decorated beautifully as well too.

After leaving the church, we had to re-enter the grounds. Not far away from where we entered is a bridge to cross the lake that forms the water gardens. The wooden bridge is at the edge with a large lake on one side and the water gardens on the other.

On the bridge, looking down toward the water gardens

I walked around the Studley Royal Water Gardens. These were created in the 1700s and were styled after mainland Europe's stylish gardens. They would have used coloured gravel and hedges to enhance the garden. Currently, these grounds are undergoing some development with hedgerows being planted to mimic the heyday of the gardens as recorded in paintings.

Temples and statues make up the unique shaped water features.

I loved this place and could have stayed longer, particularly as the weather was so nice. Also, something seemed familiar to me about this place, despite never having set foot on it previously.

While I was taking photographs at different angles, I noticed a mother and two children looking into the water for fishes or some sort of animal life. I started to look into the water as well, as I walked around the area, and I saw several toads in the water. The bloke was sitting on the side of the bank and did not walk around with me, and he mentioned seeing someone looking at some toads in the grass. At that moment, we happened to see one hopping in the grass toward us. I picked the toad up to take it over to the water, and it did not want to leave my hand. He/she clung on to my hand. I think he/she liked the warmth. Eventually, it left my hand and we watched several toads swimming around and enjoying each other's company.

Eventually, we left the toads to do their own thing that toads do, and we walked up the trail. This led away from the water's edge and onto the cliff. We went through a tunnel carved into the side of the hill, and this tower was built on the top.

The tower had nice views over the water gardens. We walked further along, through the trails with trees on both sides. Eventually, we came to this other tower. I've always loved these styles of temple with the excellent views from them. I want one. Unfortunately, the trees are a little overgrown here, so the views were not that great.

We walked further, and the next spot was the surprise view, known as "Anne Boleyn's Seat". Anne never visited this spot, but it's named after a headless statue. The statue has been replaced, but it was covered up when we visited. The views from here are amazing. Fountains Abbey is in the distance.

After enjoying the view, we walked back onto the trail, which descended the hill top and went along the lake. We watched a lone swan swimming in the lake, and he was soon joined by a couple of ducks. A fight broke out, and the swan succeeded in chasing the ducks off the water. A few minutes later, another arrived, and he hissed at the swan. The fight between the swan and goose did go on for awhile, and I got some photographs of the goose being chased and attacked, but they didn't turn out well. The goose was also chased off and gave up eventually, and he wasn't happy. He let the swan know it.

The view of Fountains Abbey across the lake are beautiful.

We soon made it around the trail to the other side of the abbey ruins. By this time, many of the visitors had left for the day. 

I went inside the abbey to take some photographs, and it felt peaceful without the crowds.

I stopped to write a couple of postcards here. I sat on the side of the nave where there's stone seating along the wall. I enjoyed the peace and quiet for awhile. There were still a few people wandering about, but this was nothing compared to how busy it had been earlier. This was a good end to a nice day, although my feet were tired by the end of it. 

I remember the first time I saw artwork by ALO, and I really loved the style of the work. It's been a while since ALO painted anything new in London, but he made an impression. I already added three albums with his work that I came across in London over two years. View the galleries here: Alo Part 1, Alo Part 2, and Alo Part 3. I never got the chance to add the pieces below to my blog as the past year has been so busy. The pieces below were all created last spring and summer.

I hope that you've enjoyed these pieces that I've finally published. There will be a few more posts like this over the coming weeks as I endeavour to publish photos that I've taken over the last year.

When I was last in London, I was happy to see a new mural on the large wall at Old Street. I covered Phlegm's work in London in my post here, and his work was among the first I recognised in London as his style and characters really stand out. The artist also painted murals on the South Bank in early 2013 and last autumn painted one of the walls on Hanbury Street. The wall on Hanbury Street still contains the artist's work, so do check it out as I have a feeling that it won't be there much longer.

Phlegm's new mural is on a large wall at Old Street. It's a difficult-to-photograph piece as there's a lot of buildings and signed/scaffolding in the way. I would love it if the street market stalls inside that courtyard had been open like they were a couple of summers ago.

The piece features one of the artist's characters inside what looks like a doll's house. The perspective is brilliant, and the detail involved must have taken the artist some time to complete. 

This is one of the most stunning pieces that I have seen painted in London recently, and it's a pity that it's so difficult to enjoy due to the obstructions.

A friend and I decided to meet up last Saturday so that we could go to London and take photographs of new street art. I have wanted to walk along Regent's Canal for awhile now as I know that there's some street art along the canal. (Actually, there was not as much as I was expecting, but I did see a couple of canal boats.) We started the day early and were at Angel station at about 8:40 in the morning. I'll start by saying how much Angel has changed. The last time I visited it was in the summer/early autumn of 2000. It's completely changed and 'gentrified'. It's amazing what can change in a little over a decade.

Angel (an underground station on the northern line) is where the journey started, and we walked east and finished the walk at Roman Road so that we could get a bus to Brick Lane. (My Nintendo DS device clocked up over 21,000 steps by the end of the day, and a good amount of this was spent on the canalside walk.)

(Map from GoogleMaps)

Above is the journey that we walked along the canal path. Ignore the places where my crudely-drawn red line does not quite follow the canal's path. We stayed along the canal banks, but we did venture up out of the path a couple of times to check out the area and get photographs, but we returned on the path to complete the walk. Of course, there were a couple of stops off along the way.

Further along from Angel station, we came to the first set of locks. It was quiet here, and we did see a couple of early-morning joggers.

We came across City Road Basin and Wenlock Basin, which are two off-shoots of the canal near Angel. They are short off-shoots, and there's some nice-looking houses and flats around this area.

Further along, we saw more locks.

I liked the painted face on this canalboat. The number of canal boats 'parked' along the banks, sometimes three deep from the side of the canal, was amazing. I wonder what living in one is like.

I liked the street art that I saw along this stetch of the canal, which was somewhere around the north of Hoxton. These purple and blue figures were poling their faces around at us, and we saw them in a few other places between here and the other side of Broadway Market.

Some of the buildings around the canal looked like warehouses. We came across a pub/cafe, but it was shut.

We then arrived near to the Kingsland Road junction, which heads across the canal and from Hoxton (in the south) to Dalston Junction (in the north). There's a few pubs and cafes on this stretch, and we stopped off at The Proud Archivist. This is a small cafe, which I had heard things about and wanted to visit for awhile.

The Proud Archivist has exhibitions and speakers, and it's a community-oriented cafe. It also has a small shop selling graphic design and photography and arty books. We stopped to have a drink, and I had a hot chocolate.

After our drinks were finished, we continued on the journey along the canal. 

The sun was shining, and I got some photographs from the bridge at Kingsland Road.

Isn't it beautiful?

Now, I had walked one small stretch of Regent Canal before. I'd gone to Broadway Market in the past, and the easiest station for me to go to in order to visit was Haggerston. From Haggerston Station, I simply walked along the canal until I came to the market. Haggerston Station is near Kingsland Road, so this was the area of the canal I walked along.

We saw some geese and more of the purple/blue/green men.

At last, we came to Broadway Market, and I took a few photographs there and bought a couple of items. We did not really look around the market much, though. I really wanted to try some food at the Schoolhouse Yard part of the market, but what I wanted to try was not there, and it was still a little too early. We arrived at about 10:30.

Bread and miniature cupcakes caught my attention. I do like Violet's cupcakes at Broadway Market and have had them before. I also tried a slice of banana bread.

Meringue Girls creates small flavoured meringues, which look so cute. I had to get a photograph, even though I've previously photographed them. I just could not resist.

We were both hungry now and wanted to sit down for awhile. By now, a lot of the cafes were packed full. However, we wandered back and found the Market Cafe, located next to the canal. We had brunch here. The scrambled eggs were so nice, and I had a watermelon martini. It was not yet noon, but I could not resist. 

After our brunch, we continued along the canal. By this time, the sun had disappeared. The remainder of our walk was in the cloud.

I saw this bulldog on one of the canal boats, and he was guarding the boat. I just had to get a photograph of him.

The area became less populated here, and the buildings and area did not look as well-kept from Broadway Market as we continued east. We saw more grafitti and had a couple of detours to get some photographs of it around Cambridge Heath Road.

We continued on our way, and the left side of the canal (which we followed), soon became clear so that we could see the large park (Victoria Park). The park was busy with visitors by then, and it was after mid-day. 

I photographed this old 'tugboat' in that area.

We soon came to Old Ford Road (the bridge below is the road) and another branch of the canal (Hertford Union Canal), which leads to Hackney Wick. 

Not much further along from here is the Roman Road junction, and that was the point that we decided to end the walk along the canal. Luckily, a number eight bus just pulled up as we had walked up from the canal, so we rode on this to get us back to the top part of Brick Lane.

I finally got to go back to London today to see what has changed on the walls in the past three weeks. As you may know from three weeks ago, I blogged in my Changes and Goodbyes post that my contract at the agency that I was at in London had come to an end. As a result, I am now not currently working in London, though I had been starting to look for a place to live there until that happened. Initially, accommodation in London was out of my reach (and still is, but I've managed to save a little) and I was actually working near to where I currently live at the time. In fact, I signed the papers for my flat on the same day that my position at that local company was made redundant, which was unforeseen. I've since been primarily working in London and commuting, which I dislike. Unexpected happenings (the Fates, as they are known in mythology, I guess) sometimes throw spanners in life. 

Moving on, I saw this progress in work on the Village Underground Wall in east London during my last week and a half in London. When I visited it on the day before my last day, my heart sank as I realised that it would not be finished before I left London. I was worried that I would never seen it finished and would only see it vandalised when I did see it. Often, work does get vandalised in London. And yes, this piece did, and the message was not a nice one to the artist, and I've used Photoshop to patch it up. Luckily, those who vandalised the work did not paint over the important aspects of the mural, and it was only in the 'white space' where the damage was done.

The mural is by Iranian artist Mehdi Ghadyanloo. Most of his work can be seen in his home city of Tehran, where he is very popular and also paid to paint the empty walls of the city. He is a master in the use of perspectie, so it appears that the subjects jump out from the wall. The image on the Village Underground shows children skipping rope. The one jumping is almost jumping high enough to reach the opening to freedome but also to where two giant crows wait to snatch him.

His work does bring colour to the streets, and I've had a look at some of his work in Tehran, and it really does brighten up the boring and blank walls of the buildings.

A few buildings down, the artist has painted a smaller piece on the side of a restaurant. It features several 'clones' being sucked into two black holes. Across the street is another piece by the artist featuring a figure walking on a tightrope toward a black hole. I wonder if both holes lead into an infinite loop.

The artist's work is currently on display at Howard Griffin Gallery in London until the 2nd of April. For more artwork, view the artist's official gallery here: https://www.behance.net/ghadyy 

After our visit to Donegal and the castle earlier in the morning, we decided to visit Marble Arch Caves. Marble Arch Caves are show caves located southeast from Donegal. We drove in this direction and also made a stop at Belleek Pottery on the way.

We stopped off at Belleek Pottery to visit the visitor's centre. There's also a museum on site, and if we had had more time, we would have done a tour. We went to the large shop and admired some of the pieces that could be seen in the main area. The porcelain looks so fragile and also so beautiful, and the pieces that are coloured are hand-painted. I absolutely loved the cornflower piece, which I got a detail of below.

The pottery looks beautiful, and the below building is their museum and visitor's centre with the shop.

We got a little lost trying to locate the visitor centre, and the phone reception was not great. We eventually arrived,  but we just missed the tour by a couple of minutes and had to wait for the next one to begin. Marble Arch Caves had one signpost but we struggled to find another one along the way and probably ended up in a detour somewhere.

Marble Arch Caves are located in Culicagh Mountain and were formed from limestone that was created 330 million years ago when the land of Ireland was near the equator and the land covered in tropical seas. The dying organisms fell to the bottom of the sea and formed the limestone.

We had a quick bite to eat at the visitor's centre. When it was time for our tour to begin, we were led out the back and followed a little trail down to the caves. The first part of the journey was by boat in the caves, across an underground river.

The journey by boat took ten minutes. We were loaded into several motorised boats and glided through the caves. Note that the boats do not run if the water levels are too high, but the caves can still be accessed.

After we reached the other side, we continued our tour with the guide. Overall, the tour in the caves takes about seventy-five minutes, and it's a pretty gentle walking tour. We were told the history of the caves. The cave system is one of the largest and its caves were found and explored in the early 1900s.

We were shown different rock formations (stalagtites and stalagmites) and told about them. However, some of these had to be repaired as vandals broke into the cave system before it was due to open and destroyed many of the formations.

We were shown the different colours of the rock formations by the types of chemicals in the stones, and we were shown a waterfall at the end of the journey with water cascading down the cave walls.

After our cave visit, we headed south to Galway. Not far away from the caves and on the main road, we were surrounded by beautiful mountain scenery that we stopped and got photographs of.

Have you been to Marble Arch Caves in Ireland?

My March Birchbox arrived on Saturday, and I was excited to see it this month as I was disappointed with last month's. The UK March Birchbox is a collaboration with the home store, Habitat. The box contains a guide that focuses on makeovers for the home. The box is designed with bright colours, and the insert inside the box contains a paint-chip style design with the different shades in pink, orange, yellow, and lime green. It also contains a voucher for a discount to use at Habitat.

Benefit "They're Real!" Mascara: This month, subscribers could choose from one of three Benefit mascaras. The new mascara from the cosmetics company is "Roller Lash". I received the "They're Real!" mascara. This is a good mascara, and it's not clumpy and the wand allows the individual lashes to be separated while the product is applied.

Catherine Malandrino 'Style de Paris' perfume: This perfume contains citrus top notes with a fruity twist. I liked the scent, but I currently own similar scents, so this one does not stand out to me personally. The perfume is a Birchbox exclusive product.

Philip Kingsley Elasticizer: Okay, I'm not happy with this one as I've had this same product in a previous Birchbox, and I thought that it left my hair looking greasy. Birchbox should prevent repeat items, but I received two repeat items in my last box. Anyway, this product is widely appraised, but it just didn't work for me, and I've actually got a another tube of it to give to a friend. The product is a pre-shampoo treatment to add volume to damaged hair.

Serenity Skincare dead sea bath salt: These Dead Sea sea salts claim to restore the balance and moisture of the skin, help with aches and pains, and de-stress. The product is natural too. I used some of the salts in a bath tonight. and it did make my body feel a little relaxed. I've never tried bath salts before, but I was glad to see this product because I wanted to try it and enjoy bath products.

TanOrganic self-tanning oil: I expected this to be a thicker cream, so when I used it for the first time, I lost some of the product down the sink. It *is* an oil, and it's to be massaged evenly into the skin. The product does not have a foul smell, but I have also not noticed any results.

This box also came with two lifestyle items, a Birchbox & Habitat red notebook to jot  things down on and an excerpt of a chapter from the book "A Perfect Heritage" by Penny Vincenzi. The notebook will come in useful as I always carry a small one in my handbag. A few months ago, I received another book excerpt in my Birchbox, but I wasn't a fan. I love reading and do get through a lot of books, but I am not really a fan of reading sample excerpts as I feel that it takes more than a chapter to get 'into' a book.

What did you think of this month's box? For me, it was another disappointment, and I'm also disappointed to receive a repeat product. The favourite product was the mascara (if that does count as I've previously used it) and the sea salts.

Pure Evil is a street artist that has been on the scene for awhile and who has been busy painting new street art from the beginning of this year. The artist has a gallery in the heart of Shoreditch. Pure Evil hails from London but lived in California for ahwile before returning back to London. His spray-painted "bunny" images can be seen in a lot of places in east London now as can his work of portraits of iconic figures. A lot of the recent street art that has been popping up since the start of last year has references to cancer. (This post is way overdue and a lot of these pieces no longer exist.)

The artist is very much involved in the world of street art and gives lectures and workshops on the subject.

This post contains several pieces of street art that the artist produced on the streets since the beginning of the year.

With all of the death and cancer messages that the artist has been adding to the streets in 2014, I assume that he had lost someone dear. On the scaffolding around the old Leonard Street car park (opposite the gallery) are several of the artist's drawings. This has evolved to contain messages throughout the months, including a "happy birthday" to his father and "Je Suis Charlie".

(For more information about Pure Evil and the gallery, visit http://www.pureevilclothing.com/indexgallery.html)