Categories
Cemo Deadbeat Donny Lucas Malarky Paul Le Chien Probs Rula Rusht

Word On The Streets Is….

All photos: NolionsInEngland

Fate conspired to stop me pressing the shutter release on any camera for 9 whole days until yesterday lunchtime. It was nothing in particular, nothing special, just a bundle of things from the normal routine of life that cuts perpendicular across a passion for street art and graff. Yesterday lunchtime every surface seemed to throw up a splash of colour and artistic intervention begging to be memorised. Though Graffoto tends to be about the words, for a change here’s a string of pics which would normally be consigned to flickr where the image is the law.

CEMO
CEMO

Last time out, Graffoto reported on the toyish dogging doings of someone with a grudge against Malarky’s colourful shutter and wall murals; the street cartoon machine didn’t let that stay up for long, completely re-doing the Redchurch St wall with a notably more gnarly and snarly tone.

Malarky, Lucas
Malarky, Lucas

At the other end of the size range there were a lot of ultra small interventions catching the eye and begging to be photographed. A prominent proponent of what we might refer to as the beauty in the male form, this Paul Le Chien sticker isn’t new by a long shot but yesterday the colours and composition begged to be photographed.

Paul Le Chien
Paul Le Chien

Still at the macro scale, someone had a minor clearout of their toy collection or, as HowAboutNo observed, possibly something from a cereal packet. Just one of those quirky little bits you find that you can’t see any rhyme or reason for its presence but it’s just good someone thought it should go there. “Artist” unknown.

DSC_6854
Unknown

Back up to the mahoosive, productions in this car park plot escape the usual life cycle of dogging and 1 day max going over, perhaps due to the 24 hour security presence. This new(ish?) piece by Probs echoes and appropriates the rail line that arcs over the plot, so much so that I wanted to bring that link into the picture which is my lame excuse for this somewhat contorted context shot.

Probs burning bridges
Probs

DON has been out there smashing prominent “street art trail” spots which will keep the tour guides happy. You’ve got to admire the quality and detail of this partially stencilled piece, the two characters also by DON mugging their way into the shot are Darwin and Hirst.

DON
DON UA

This collection of irregularly sized charcoal portraits look sweet. Would they have been better spread around the parish rather than clustered in this one over-pasted go-to “urban back alley”?

DSC_6852-1
Unknown

What is the word on the streets? For some reason none of the massive number of doorways bearing ancient and modern tags made it onto the camera’s memory stick but RUSHT is one of the few writers who deems the Shoreditch art fag vortex worth bothering with, here’s a dirty and new Rusht piece.

RUSHT
RUSHT

This sticker is cool. Whoever the proud stickerist is, they wanted to create a long lasting legacy as this is about 10 feet off the ground. Artist anyone?

DSC_6888
Unknown

One more sticker, bit of a curio, this is an image of the flyer advertising Banksy’s Graffiti, Hostility and Jubilee show in Southwark in May 2002. The event went ahead based around various Banksy images including the Monkey Queen and sentry with pants down but the fuzz were all over it. Why make a sticker of this? Why cross out the date? You think got a micro piece-ette of a Banksy factoid you want to hide from us? Pesky forum types perhaps.

DSC_6850
Unknown

Getting more sculptural here, no idea who this is by, possibly an artist with a show that I missed but it’s nice to see someone putting up something one off, crafted and abstract.

DSC_6911
Unknown

You just can’t beat a bit of colour and the writing IS the word, so it’s good to end with a nice piece by RULA ONE.

Rula one
RULA ONE

0 replies on “Word On The Streets Is….”

oh dear, I thought I was likely to charged with allowing my innocent, almost naive, enjoyment of that particular walk to cloud my usual judgement of what does and does not have merit. I can be a real cynical so-and-so when it comes to both the true art merit of the work on the streets and the motives of the "artist", though I try NOT to let that come out on Graffoto.

If you mean my response to that Banksy related sticker, guilty as charged on that one. On a mellow day you'll find me being merely cynical when contemplating the motives of both his PR organisation and his legions of online fan boys. Other days …..

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *