Results matching “paint”

I know that the World Cup is over. I have so many photographs and posts to post that I forgot about these lurking, and I still wanted to share them, even though England went out early (which is not a surprise) and the games have been over for a month now. I previously mentioned street artist Cranio's World Cup mural (Cranio's Mural on Great Eastern Street), which did not last long. He was not the only one to be influenced by the games. Artists Martin Ron (New Mural by Martin Ron on Hanbury Street and Martin Ron's 'Badgergate' Mural) and ALSO were also inspired by it.

Martin Ron painted a brightly-coloured crowd of chanting or shocked apes. They look like they are watching the game, their expressions watching the same direction in awe or shock, clutching the blanket underneath them. The colours mimic the colourful flags of the teams. The artwork does not claim to be inspired by the games, but it turned up at the same time as them and reminds me of a group of people watching them. It is located in the outside bar area in Ely's Yard.

On Hanbury Street, the building that hosted the pop-up drinks (Lucky Juice) this spring also hosted a World Cup social media tie-in. This included several thousands of small green, yellow, and blue ribbons that were restocked each day, each with their own message related to the World Cup. Visitors are encouraged to take one ribbon. The ribbons are printed with World Cup social media posts. I took one that said "I wish I was a WAG". The definition of a WAG is "wives and girlfriends" and it's always related to girls who are dating sports/football players. (Actually, I don't really wish I was a WAG of course.) 

According to some information on the wall next to the ribbons, they are good luck charms and each measures 47cm, the length of Christ's arms in a small church of Senhor Do Bonfim. The poster informs takers of the ribbons to tie the ribbon around your wrist in three knots, and when the ribbon falls off, the wish comes true.

And last but not least, this scene of a boy playing football (or soccer if you are American) while a woman chases after him appeared just off of Brick Lane. The painting is by ALSO.

Puerto Rican artist Alexis Díaz's new mural has been on display for about a month now. Visitors to my blog may remember his work last summer of an octopus-elephant hybrid that appeared on Hanbury Street (just off Brick Lane) and remained there for some time; there's a chance many have seen it in real life. (My original post can be read here: Street Art: Alexis Díaz.)This summer, the artist came back to London and created an eel-skeleton-tree-octopus hybrid. 

As last year, I caught the artist at work. I also discovered the gradient-painted blue to green to yellow wall first and wondered what was going to go up there. Then I caught the sketch and the mural beginning to take shape over the top of it. This time, the artist painted the gradient background directly onto the wall first. The sketch was then completed and the background colour outside of the sketch was painted over in white. This technique is opposite to what the artist completed last time as this time, the gradient background is a part of the sketch.

The subject is equally as strange as the elephant-octopus last summer. However, this time, bits of the mural look like tree branches, and other areas look like bone, octopus, and eel. A couple of close-ups of the mural are below.

As usual, I enjoyed seeing this artist's work pop up on London's streets.

Throughout the month of July, Greenwich Village in London hosted a charity sculpture trail of 32 animal sculptures based on well-known UK creatures. These includes owls, cows, pigs, horses, and frogs. Many of the shops and Greenwich Market contained one or more of these animal sculptures on display. Books About Town, another sculpture trail, also had a couple smaller-sized books on display as a part of this trail. 

The sculptures were painted by Corelli College students, and they were painted to raise money for various animal charities. The sculptures were also meant to engage and inspire visitors to use social media to share their photographs. 

Unfortunately the animal trail has ended now, but more of these animal sculptures can be seen on their Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/corellicreaturecarnival

"Save the Bees" street art went up in London toward the end of May. Artists Masai and Jim Vision were a couple of the artists who painted bees on several walls in Shoreditch. They used the hashtag #SaveTheBees to draw awareness to this issue that if bees become extinct, so will we. Several murals of bees with the campaign were painted on London's streets, and I managed to photograph several of these before they were later painted over.

'Save the Bees' on Sclater Street

Brainwaithe Street (Wheler Street)

Vallance Street

Hackney Road

Shutter art

One of my favourite pieces of new street art to appear recently in east London has been by Luis Gomez de Teran. I love the classic style of his paintings with figures. The artist, originally from Venezuela, now lives in Rome. He visited London this May and June, and two pieces were painted just off of Brick Lane. The later piece featured three models of women with text. Two of the women are touching hands and have flowers in their hair and are wearing drapery. The shadows and light and drapery is done quite well, and I love the bright flowers in the hair against the darkness of the background. The interaction of the girls shows emotion and delicacy. 

The third woman, with her long back and red drapery, looks a little bit out of place in the scene and her back and angles do not look quite right which is a little bit of a shame, but I love the shading of her face and her shoulders here. 

The first mural by Gomez was painted near to the second. It is no longer there, but it was on Pedley Street. The image shows a dark-haired girl peering over a ledge. It looks like she may be peering into her reflection because you can see a reflection of her hands and knee. Again, this is a stunning piece.

For more information about the artist, see his Facebook page at: https://www.facebook.com/luis.gomezdeteran

To commemorate the 100 year anniversary of the start of World War 1, two ships painted with dazzle camouflage have been commissioned. One of these is located on the Thames in London, and the other is located near Albert Dock in Liverpool. The dazzle camougflage is created with different geometric shapes. It is not meant to hide the ships; it is used to make the ships more difficult to shoot at because their speed and direction cannot be as accurately judged.

Carlos Cruz-Diez, a Venezuelan artist, painted the ship 'Edmund Gardner' in Liverpool (above). This ship is part of this year's Liverpool Biennial art display that takes place with various artworks located in and around the city. The 'HMS President' was given the dazzle treatment by artist Tobias Rehberger, a German sculptor (below).

For more information about these dazzle ships, visit the official 14-18 NOW website: http://www.1418now.org.uk/whats-on/dazzle-ships/ 

To remember the beginning of World War 1, now a hundred years ago, Liverpool put on a show with giant marionettes and men and women dressed in period clothing from 1914. The artistic talent behind the parade is Jean-Luc Courcoult of Royal de Luxe, and they are behind the life-like and theatrical giants. The giants for this 'Memories of 1914' event include the 30-foot tall little girl, her dog Xolo, and the 25-foot grandmother. The grandmother was announced only a few weeks ago, and she's the first marionette by the company to have silicon 'skin'.

The marionettes are primarily made from wood and steel. The hair is made from horse hair. A series of pulleys allowes them to walk and show expressions. They blink and move and seem to embody the nature of their character by the way they move, blink, and show facial expressions. Xolo the dog even drolls. (There are water hoses that go to his mouth.)

The dog's movements are very clever, and he can even run very fast. The tag wags, and he even has a set of teeth and his eyes are painted to show veins. (His eyes look more human than dog, but he uses his mouth, eyes and ears to convey the expression.) He can even stand on his back legs. 

Royal de Luxe put on various small and large scale shows, and Liverpool has seen the giants previously in 2012 when they marked the anniversary of the sinking of the 'Titanic'. This was in part funded by their Capital of Culture Year in 2008. The story for this event was inspired by a little girl's letter to a family member on the ship. The little girl met her uncle, dressed in a diver's uniform, and Xolo also played a part in the story.

We opted to go up on the Friday to take advantage of one more day in Liverpool and to see the giants on a slightly quieter day. The press reported that many had queued for hours to see the grandmother in St. George's Hall on the Thursday, so I knew it was going to be busy. However, we were extremely unlucky with traffic, and a normal 3-hour car journey took us nine hours as we got stuck first before Newbury (Berkshire), just down the road from where we live, and the traffic was literally stop-and-start all the way to Liverpool. By the time we arrived, it was just after 7:00 in the evening, and the giant's were resting. 

However, we went out the next morning and did some touristy things before we went to Kensington Street (the Islignton side and not far from St. George's Hall) to wait for the giants.Grandma giant led the way.

Her wheelchair was being driven along in front of her. That is one giant wheelchair for a giant grandmother!

And look how large her slippers are! Grandma must like comfortable things. Can you imagine walking about town in slippers all day? Of course, she just woke up. I was amazed at how life-like her features and movements were.

It took several people to control grandma giant's legs. They would queue up onto the vehicle behind her and one of them would jump off the vehicle to make the pulley move grandma's leg so it could 'walk' This was done in turns on either side, and once the person finished their turn, the rope would be handed to the next one in the queue. This looked like incredible tough work. I imagine grandma's legs are quite strong.

About twenty minutes behind grandma was Xolo and the little girl. The little girl sat on top of a bus. The handlers were having a break.

Xolo seemed to be the most popular with everyone. In the photograph below, a little boy pets Xolo. He got the opportunity to sit on top of Xolo just before.

The little girl, Xolo, and grandma arrive by St. George's Hall for a story-telling. This brings the show into the World War 1 theme.

After the grandmother's story telling, which was a grotesque story about the horrors of war and soldiers on the front line in the trenches, the grandmother fell asleep in front of St. George's Hall. Yes, she did actually snore too.

The little girl and Xolo went to fall asleep under a parasol with her radio playing. There are several props for the characters. The little girl also has a scooter, goggles, a radio, and a suitcase.

Later in the day and after the giants had a rest, I caught up with the giant's again near the Liver Building. I did not get a great view to watch the grandmother, but she told another war story. I could hear it better this time, and it was a letter written by a soldier from Liverpool. Grandmother also had several props, including glasses, a wheelchair, a walking stick, and whiskey flask. Apparently she could break wind and spits, but I did not see her do either.

Xolo stole the show again, of course. The kids love him.

Grandmother waved as she passed by on her wheelchair.

On the Sunday, the giants put on a large parade before leaving the city of Liverpool. Confetti was used, and the grandmother, little girl, and dog walked down the Strand. We were at the far end where their giant beds were waiting.

While the giants were being manoeuvered into their beds, we watched the parade of soldiers and some of us were handed the "Your country needs you" war flyers.

The grandmother and little girl and launched into the air so they could be placed into their giant beds.

Of course, this could not be complete without the World War 1 march. These guys were dressed in 1914-style clothing. 

The little girl on her bed is tucked in with a big blanket.

Up and down the Strand, Xolo played. I caught him drinking water from a bucket on one of the days. He also has a bone that he can carry.

This is a quick one tonight as I wanted to get my photographs up and I hope you enjoyed these photos. Liverpool also has other artwork and events this year with their Liverpool Biennial, and Giant Spectacular was just one of these events. Some of these coincide with the anniversary of the Great War.

Last weekend was the street art event "Meeting of Styles" which saw several street artists paint new murals across several locations in east London. Locations included Pedley Street, Sclater Street, Redchurch Street, Hewett Street, and New Inn Yard. "Meeting of the Styles" takes place in several cities worldwide and is an excuse for street artists to get together and paint and meet each other. Over the weekend, the walls were transformed with new work. Unfortunately, I was unable to be there during the event but I managed to capture several photographs of it on Monday.

Lost Souls, Ryan Kai, XI Design and others transformed Sclater Street.  

Core, Kaes, Masai, BraveOne, Chu and Inkfetish painted the walls on Pedley Street just off of Brick Lane. Some of these, including the one by Inkfetish and Chu, did not last very long. In fact, Inkfetish was annoyed and left a message in response to his work being so quickly painted-over by Graffiti Life. I thought that this would create an outrage as the piece did not last long, and I was actually surprised that Graffiti Life did not wait a little longer to paint over this piece. However, this is the nature of street art. Sometimes even really good pieces do not last long at all. (I do find the one by Chu to be a little offensive, so that is possibly why part of it was painted over.)

The large wall on Pedley Street was painted on with a collaboration of artists (Gent and Vibes and others).

Also on Pedley Street appeared work by Cenz, Rolling People, and others.

Redchurch Street saw new work by Jim Vision, Zadock, and Zina.

Some work was painted off of Great Eastern Street and in a car park there.

I also captured the above on Hewett Street, including a couple of pieces that have been there for a bit longer that I had not captured yet. The one with the wolf above is Jim Vision and Dan Chase.

Lost Souls also painted, in collaboration with others, near Redchurch Street.

The site of Shakespeare's theatre in New Inn Yard was also a location, and Cenz, Dank and others painted there.

On the Monday morning after the event, I captured the above work in progress.

Brainwaithe Street near Shoreditch High Street station saw a lot of new pieces by various artists.

And the car park on Sclater Street saw some new work painted onto its walls.

Artist Faith47 was in London recently and painted a couple of new street art murals new Brick Lane. Exotic animals feature often, and last summer she painted tigers near on of the current spots. I covered this here: Street Art: Faith47, Cernesto, Rolling People, Edwin, and many more. "Marauders - the strong and the weak" is the title of one of the murals. Both feature male lions.

New artwork by JimmyC (more of his work can be seen here: Street Art: JimmyC - Jenikya's Blog) appeared in London this year. One piece appeared near Petticoat Lane Market on the side of a pub. It is made using coloured dots of paint lumped together to create light and shadow and other features. One of the most famous pieces by the artist appeared in 2012 with a portrait of Olympic runner Usain Bolt.

Several of the new pieces around east London included splotches of paint drops. Some of these were shaped as hearts (as the one photographed below) with the artist's name underneath some of them.