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Tag Archives: Bristol

Opening: Sickboy – ‘Optical Delusions’ @ Harvey Nichols (Bristol)

Mixing art and fine dining, Sickboy (interviewed) is kicking off his latest show at the high-end department store Harvey Nichols tonight with a launch dinner and artist’s talk. Optical Delusions is presented by Fluorescent Smogg and builds upon his ever-expanding use of semiotics to create a dream-like world that glows and radiates light. The Bristol-based artist has long experimented with an array of unorthodox mediums: from painting on bell-jars in the early 2000s, to creating tapestries a decade later and onwards to the lightboxes which […]

Showing: “Vanguard” @ M-Shed

Currently midway through a four month run at Bristol’s M-Shed Museum, Vanguard explores the development of the city’s graffiti and street art scene and its global impact from the early 1980s until today. The exhibition opens with the story of the birth of graffiti in the city and how the spark lit by Robert ‘3D’ Del Naja and the Z-Boys was kindled into a flame at the Dugout youth club in Barton Hill. That story has been told many times before, both in print and […]

Streets: Banksy (Bristol)

Delivering an early Christmas present to the people of Bristol, Banksy has painted a new work depicting a sneezing pensioner in the neighborhood of Totterdown. The area acquired its name because the steepness of the hills make it appear that the terrace houses are tottering, or tumbling, down the precipitous slope towards the River Avon below. The piece itself is located on Vale Street which at 22° is the steepest residential street in the UK and the native West Country artist has played with these angles […]

Showing: Sickboy – ‘Dreamworlds’ @ That Art Gallery

Sickboy (interviewed) is currently presenting an exhibition of 16 new works at That Art Gallery in Bristol. Dreamworlds is the first solo show back in his adopted home-city since 2010 and represents a further progression in the development of the painter’s studio practice. Familiar motifs from the artist’s lexicon are still present, such as the fluttering birds which featured more heavily in his early work, depictions of the ephemera and curios which the artist collects and the walking heart that has more recently been made into an […]

Streets – Upfest (2018) Bristol

Upfest returned to celebrate its 10th anniversary recently with approximately 350 artists from across the globe leaving their mark on the streets of Bristol. A central theme across the whole weekend was the 100 years which have passed since some women first got the right to vote in the UK. For example, Jody Thomas‘ gold-masked figure takes the meek and victimized Little Red Riding Hood from Victorian fairytales and recasts her as someone who is both eminently capable and confidently self-assured. The festival also saw The London Police bring their […]

Streets: Upfest 2017 (Bristol)

Last weekend saw 250 artists and an estimated 40,000 members of the public descend on Bristol’s Southville and Bedminster neighborhoods for Upfest. The event has grown into the largest annual painting festival in Europe since its inception in 2008 and this year’s installment included large-scale murals by Kobra, Eelus and Jody Thomas. Will Barras and Xenz collaborated on a new wall which is teeming with detail that draws the eye in and holds the viewer’s attention; utopian landscapes and opalescent butterflies are intertwined with timeless cosmonauts and […]

Openings: David Shillinglaw – ‘Tales of Ordinary Madness’ @ That Gallery

David Shillinglaw (featured) opens his new exhibition entitled Tales of Ordinary Madness today at That Gallery in Bristol. The exhibition coincides with a time of change for the British artist as he moves out of the home and studio which has been his base for the last 12 years and on to new adventures. The works featured include a variety of medium such as paintings on found wood, appliqué, painted collage and a piece comprised of 400 individual sketches of people who he has sat […]

Streets: Banksy (Bristol)

As per usual with the elusive British art superstar, a new piece by Banksy was discovered out of nowhere at Bridge Farm Primary School in Bristol this morning. The work was done as a thank you gift to the children that named one of the houses after him. A few weeks ago, the school ran a competition to change house names, and ended up deciding to name them after Bristol legends. After the children choose Brunel, Blackbeard, Cabot and Banksy, the school officials wrote to Banksy’s team to let […]

Studio Visits: Nick Walker – ‘Entropy’ @ Above Second (Hong Kong)

Ahead of his upcoming solo show Entropy at Above Second Gallery opening September 17th in Hong Kong, we popped by the studio of Bristol-based Nick Walker (interviewed). For this new exhibition, the British street artist has been exploring new ideas and broadening the scope of his signature Gentleman Vandal series to more abstract imagery and new techniques playing with metal and sculpture. “A new element I am exploring with this show is ‘Numbers’ which I call the Smoke series. Originally I was inspired by Jasper Johns some time back and began […]

Streets: Banksy (Bristol)

Yesterday, despite a recent hoax alleging his arrest, Banksy revealed his new work on his website – Banksy.co.uk. The piece titled The Girl with the Pierced Eardrum was painted the night before at Dockside Studios in Bristol, but shortly after the reveal it got defaced with a splash of black paint. The pieces is a parody of Dutch master painter Johannes Vermeer’s Girl With A Pearl Earring. Using stencil and what seems to be an extinguisher with black paint, the elusive artist created a clever bastardized version incorporating the alarm bell on the […]