Graffiti Spectrum by Frank Street

GRAFFITI S P E C T R U M

FRANK STREET

GRAFFITI S P E C T R U M FRANK STREET

01 02 06 08 10

Contents Introduction Stik Mear One Pixel Pancho Nychos and Flying Förtress

12 Conor Harrington 13 Sat One 14 Inkie 15 TCF crew 16 Dicey and Aji 17 Acerone 18 Feek 19 Chase 20 Bode

22 24 25 26 28 30 31 32 33 34 36 37 38 40

Lucy Mc Lauchlan COI crew Vyal Cheo M City Soker and Kashink Lyken Sickboy and Roa Can Two, Seize, China Mike, Rich T, Zase and Mr Jago KTF and RAW crew T.Rex and Rows Skyline view Block party Graffiti Artists comments

FRONT COVER

Artist Stik Photograph Frank Street

ADDITIONAL THANKS TO John Nation, Chase, Acerone, Lyken, Stik, Vyal and Ryder

ARTISTS

TCF crew (Acerone, Aji, Dicey, Feek, Xens, Ekoe, Paris), Mear One, Pixel Panch, Sat One, Nychos, Flying Fortress, Stik, Rows, Kashink, Lucy Mc Lauchlan, Bode, Cheo, M City, Conor Harrington, Chase, Roa, Inkie, Soker, COI crew (Vyal, Werc, Man One), Lyken, Sickboy, Mr Jago, KTF and RAW crews (Ryder, Mr Riks, Poster, Molar, T.Rex, Sigh1, Silent hobo, Haka, Lokey, Ames, Devas), Mo1, CK1, Rich T, Seize, China Mike, Can Two, Zase

PHOTOGRAPHY, RESEARCH EDITORIAL,GRAPHIC DESIGN, DIGITAL, COLOUR MANAGEMENT Frank Street

All photography is the copyright of Frank Street, images may not be reproduced, copied, transmitted or manipulated without prior written permission from Frank Street at frankstreet@hotmail.com The full copyright of this book remains with the publisher, nothing in this book can be reproduced by any means in whole or in part without the prior written permission from the publisher at frankstreet@hotmail.com, whilst the publisher has endeavoured to ensure that the content and material submitted is accurate the publisher does not accept any liability for any of its content.

Introduction

n August 2012 I spent six days at the location of the ‘See No Evil’ event in Nelson Street, Bristol, UK, home to the largest urban street art gallery of its kind in the UK. Nelson Street was also the former address of the Bristol Magistrates court since the 1960’s, where the trial of those arrested in ‘Operation Anderson’ the UK’s biggest graffiti bust was held. The eight-storey complex that fully closed operating four years ago re-locating itself to a new £25-million building in Marlborough Street, is now one of the largest buildings in the event having graffiti artwork applied to its walls. During the first five days I took a series of images documenting the progress and completion of the majority of its second year selection of local, national and international graffiti street artists from a diversity of backgrounds with different styles. Together they used an estimated 3,500 cans of spray paint and 700 litres of liquid paint to brighten up the run down and neglected area of the city centre in need of regeneration. Towards the end of the fifth day preparations began to transform the location into a New York style ‘Block Party’, where the artworks that had been created became backdrops for the estimated 50,000 party goers that attended, who had a choice of five music zones and events to enjoy throughout the day. The artists worked around the clock on their artworks whilst having to deal with a range of factors from, working at varying heights, different metallic, glass, brickwork, wooden and rendered surfaces as well as alternating weather conditions of sun and rain. They implemented a wide range of techniques using stencils, masking tape, rollers, marker pens, liquid paint and spray cans during the process of creating the graffiti spectrum of street art for the event. Whilst their daytime work blended into the usual activity of the area, prior to any evening work commencing required the closure of Nelson Street to road traffic, allowing for truck mounted boom lift cranes to enter the site and elevate the artists more than several storeys up the sides of buildings. Portable generators and flood lighting were used to enable the artists to see their progress as they worked through the night and into the early hours of the morning. The Nelson Street location of the ‘See No Evil’ gallery temporarily provides the City of Bristol with one of its attractions for visitors and urban street art fans from around the world. The artworks are impressive and have plenty of wow factor, however most will only be around until they are painted over by another artist creating a jaw dropping piece of artwork, or until the buildings themselves are demolished for re-development. This book concisely documents the majority of the artists that took part with a profiled insight about them and their work as well as the area in which the event took place.

Stik

he two giants, one looking up and the other down, created a wave of mobile phones as they were raised and lowered by the block party goers when they photographed them some thirteen storeys up on the side of a student accommodation block. An altitude that London based artist Stik endured over two evenings and nights whilst on the end of a thirty metre truck mounted boom lift, using about forty litres of white masonry paint and six boxes of spray cans to achieve the result shown here, on this his highest, largest and most challenging piece to date. Stik has always had an interest in graffiti as its a free art form and has taken it seriously over the past ten years, he sketches his concepts dozens of times before doing them for real, as he finds that a lot of work goes into making something look simple. On a slightly smaller scale he creates large canvases of his stick themed characters from his studio, and has had them bought by Elton John, Bono, Tinie Tempah, Chris Martin, Goldie, Ed Sheeran and has done a mural and portrait for Brian May. Whilst having this success he still paints illegally and is known to the police and council for making the walls tidier than they already were, he once did a large illegal piece in Mayfair central London that after getting back home he did not feel happy with and went back to black it out. When I asked him if this particular piece had a title he told me, “Haven’t thought of one yet. I think the people in the building should name them”. He also had this to say for anyone interested in taking up graffiti, “Wear a gas mask, your lungs are important”. To view his numerous graffiti artworks see the map that can be found on his website. www.stik.org.uk

Graffiti Spectrum

Mear One

ear One AKA Kalen Ockerman, born in 1971, Santa Cruz, California is based in Los Angeles where he started his graffiti artist career in 1986. By the early 1990â&#x20AC;&#x2122;s he had already established himself through his works on the streets, Hip-hop album covers, street wear clothing and graffiti culture. â&#x20AC;&#x160; He uses a fine art realism style to create large scale works of characters in a perspective with a dramatic background, as shown in this piece of a graffiti artist jumping over a fence to evade the pursuing helicopter whilst still holding onto his can of spray paint. Kalen also creates his work on canvas using acrylic and airbrush techniques.

Graffiti Spectrum

Pixel Pancho

ecognised for his hybrid creations, as in this example of a mechanical phoenix bird like creature with a transparent cylindrical neck, detailed riveted panels and fretwork underside. Pixel Pancho’s work can be seen across Europe and Warsaw, containing references from the works of Joaquin Sorolla, Salvador Dali, ‘El Equipo Cronica’, Ron English, and Takashi Murakami. Born in 1984, Turin, Italy, he studied art and design at the Albertina Academy of Fine Arts followed by a degree from the Academy of Fine Arts in Valencia, Spain. It was around this time that he became influenced by graffiti and began using spray can and marker pens on outdoor surfaces whilst the other students continued to use paper and canvas. In 2010 he returned back to his home town of Turin were he is based and opened his own studio creating works on canvas.

Graffiti Spectrum

Nychos

ychos’s interest and inspiration for his current style of anatomy based work came from his Austrian family of traditional hunters, when as a youngster he observed how his father gutted animals. This piece illustrates a mythical creature with the heads of three different animals attached to a body with legs and wings and a jukebox character holding on tightly for the ride, appropriately titled ‘Jukebox Chimera Beast’. Nychos is the founder of REM (Rabbit Eye Movement) that start in 2005 and that expanded itself into the REM Art space for artists of different backgrounds within graffiti, street art and illustration to get involved with.

Flying Förtress

he jukebox character in this collaborative piece is by Munich, Germany based artist Flying Förtress, who incorporated the character that can also be seen getting up to all sorts of adventures in various locations around the world, and in other collaborative pieces with Nychos. Flying Förtress has a series of designs on skateboard decks, T-shirts and a range of ‘Teddy Troop’ toys and consumables.

Graffiti Spectrum

Conor Harrington

rom Cork in Ireland, Conor Harrington makes use of his graffiti and contemporary background to produce his current body of historical and military themed artworks.

He did his first piece of graffiti in October, 1984, after first seeing an example of it at the age of twelve in a National Geographic magazine, before then he had not seen anything like it before. It was also around this time that he started getting into Hip-hop and realised that they were kind of linked together. His work flow includes photographing the concept under diffused lighting then viewing it on a computer laptop screen to paint the image onto large canvases.

Graffiti Spectrum

Sat One

at One AKA Rafael Gerlach was born in 1977, Venezuela, South America and grew up in Munich, Germany where he is based and works as an illustrator and artist. He became inspired to start drawing graffiti after seeing illegal graffiti on the sides of railway tracks in Munich. His current working style is a mixture of graphic and abstract as shown in his finished piece below, the size of the bus stop gives you an idea of the grand scale of this deep and meaningful piece of work, that runs along what used to be the Juvenile Magistrate Courts. Titled â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Mural competitionâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;, with a selection of comic superheroes, whilst at the same time making a parallel between them and the way in which some artists are treated as celebrated heroes.

Graffiti Spectrum

Inkie

ondon based artist Inkie AKA Tom Bingle is from Bristol, UK, were he was inspired by the 1983 Hip-hop film ‘Wild Style’ produced by Charlie Ahearn, punk rock album graphics, 2000AD comics, the book Subway Art, and early New York wild style pioneers such as Dondi, Seen and T-Kid, and was a student at South Gloucestershire and Stroud College. He was a member of the Crime Inc crew in 1983, has worked alongside Banksy, in 1989 came second in the World Street Art championships that was also the year he was arrested along with over seventy others in the UK’s largest ever graffiti bust ‘Operation Anderson’. In 1998 Inkie collaborated with Banksy on the ‘Walls On Fire’ project, where they brought the UK’s finest street artists to create a 1.4 kilometre painting around Bristol’s historic docks where the ‘@ Bristol’ centre now stands, and in 2007 was featured in the Los Angeles produced graffiti documentary film ‘Bomb It’. The cartoon character Cheech Wizard sits on his work desk and he designs content for video game industry giants and major clothing companies. His Art Nouveau style canvas and prints are available for purchase in galleries and exhibitions of his work have taken place in London, Barcelona, Los Angeles, Ibiza, Warsaw, Belfast and Lisbon. From one of his shows in 2010 he donated 25% to Southmead Hospital’s Cochlear implant programme. The ‘See No Evil’ event was the idea of Inkie who organised it partly after seeing similar events in Lisbon and Melborne, and thinking that it was about time that Bristol, home of urban art in the UK had a similar event.

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TCF crew

wentieth Century Frescoes crew are a collaboration of seven artists, shown here to the left working on their wall space are Acerone, Aji, Dicey and Feek, who worked on individual pieces for the lower section of their wall. The wall area extended across one of security van entrances of the old Magistrates Court complex where the TCF lettering was placed by Xens, Ekoe and Paris, who also did the upper section of silhouetted buildings with plumes of smoke and butterflies set in a colourful skyline. They made their individual pieces connect by extending parts and areas of their own into and through the others.

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Dicy

icy grew up in Wolverhampton, West Midlands and did a two year art foundation course in Birmingham, UK, followed by a move down to Bristol, UK, enrolling on a degree course in 3D design. With his strong background in art design he became recognised for his 3D and graphic lettering, that has evolved into explosive abstract graffiti that he now creates by using a range of freehand spray can techniques and masking tape on walls and canvases.

Aji

ike the branches of a tree Aji’s freehand spray can wood effect twists and turns its way around the TCF crew wall section, whilst at the same time providing a source of food supply for the work created by ‘Feek’. He’s a Bristol, UK, based artist where his street art can be seen locally, has produced work at festivals, created Xmas cards and held exhibitions.

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Acerone

orn in Bristol 1978, Acerone AKA Luke Palmer is a Bristol, UK based artist who as a young teenager discovered graffiti, spray cans and subway art. He made his first spray can mark on the side of a garage down the lane at the back of the house were he lived at the time. He started tagging around 1995, his first outline and fill-in was on the side of Horfield prison one night, only to discover the following day that cheap Holts paint is easily absorbed by red brick walls as it could hardly be seen, then after meeting Dicy and Paris started taking it more seriously. At four metres high and forty metres wide his largest piece to date was painted under Brunel Way, Cumberland Basin, Bristol, that he painted in one day using 60 litres of emulsion and ten spray cans of black. Acerone’s style could be described as photo-graffiti, as he digitally manipulates images taken under low lighting conditions capturing light trails, then transforms them into photo montages for reference whilst applying a range of spray can techniques, masking tape and brushwork with emulsion and acrylic paints, to create large scale pieces on walls and onto canvases for exhibitions. This piece is titled ‘Hope for Change from Young Sons,’ Acerone explains, “It depicts a knight on an iron horse emerging from an urban forest representing the transition from boyhood to manhood, the rider represents the intelligence or intellect or mind, and the horse stands for the animal desires and instincts and energies that have their home there.” He enjoys and thrives on collaborative projects that have given him the opportunity of working with world class artist from which he has gained a wealth of skills and knowledge. This is his advise for anyone thinking of taking up graffiti, “The most interesting artists are the ones who take little notice of the rules and trends and paint for themselves, do your own thing, don’t worry about ‘keeping it real’, keep it fun, original and reflective of your own personality.” He also wanted to say, “A big thank you to all those who have taken an interest and supported my work over the years.” www.acerone.org

Graffiti Spectrum

Feek

eek enjoys working on large scale projects in collaboration with other like minded artists and was in his element whilst working on this TCF crew piece of a hybrid mechanical snail, with arms that reach out to feast off its surrounding growth provided by the work of ‘Aji’s’ tree growth. Its inspiration came from the second highest rainfall to be recorded in more than a century that brought along with it increased numbers of snails and slugs.

Graffiti Spectrum

Chase

rom Antwerp, Belgium, Chase is now an artist based in Hollywood, California and where his largest piece of work stretching along four walls can be seen at Venice Beach, that took him about sixteen days using a lot of house paint and around a hundred and twenty spray cans. Chase started as a tagger between 1992-1995 before moving to the USA were he now asks people to paint on their walls. In Antwerp he was into skateboarding and listening to Hip-hop whilst hanging out with his friends, locally he was influenced by Duck and Arkis as well as Mode2, Delta and Won. His most challenging piece was with Bue The Warrior in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, as the scaffolding was balanced on stones and random planks on an uneven dirt field, that meant it was on the verge of collapsing at any moment. He enjoys working collaboratively as it gives him the opportunity to learn from whoever he’s working with, and says that “it’s important to feel each other’s style and decisions as there’s more than one mind working creatively.” His art style and direction in which he’s taking his work is influenced by concentric cubism mixed with symbolism and surrealistic touches, before starting a wall he occasionally scribbles out a very basic layout and use images for reference whilst painting. ‘Panspermia’ is the title of this piece inspired by the astrophysics theory of Panspermia, the idea that life on Earth was seeded from Mars during the many known meteor showers that hit Earth throughout it’s history, he used a range of spray can techniques paint, masking tape and a few stencils, whilst painting it his main challenges were dealing with the long durations of heavy rain falls. He had this advice to anyone interested in starting to do graffiti, “Whatever it is, if you truly feel it, do it. Don’t get hung up on talking about things, just do the work because that’s where the real enjoyment is.” He also had this to say, “I just want to say a big thank you to my man Inkie, he’s such a humble soul with an amazing vision.” www.theartofchase.com www.facebook.com/theartofchase

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Bode

orn 1963, Utica, New York, Bode is the son of legendary cartoonist Vaughn Bode and creator of the infamous comic strip character ‘Cheech Wizard’, illustrated here in his finished piece wearing ankle boots with a ‘C’ and ‘W’ who always appears with black and red stars. Bode used various spray can techniques and permanent marker pens for the dragon on the dress and the fine detail on the fan. His spray can work can also be seen in London, Spain, Italy, Germany and in his home town of San Francisco. Exhibitions of his work have been shown at the Psychedelic Solution Gallery in New York, New Museum of Contemporary Art in New York and the Upper Playground Gallery in San Francisco. He also took up the art of tattooing in 1994 after being trained by Al Valenta, from Western Massachusetts, and Myke Maldonado, from New York.

Graffiti Spectrum

Lucy Mc Lauchlan

ell renowned for her mono tone contemporary street art with usually one other colour added, born in 1978, Birmingham, UK, Lucy is one of the leading international female street artists, and has exhibited her work in art galleries around Europe, Japan and Australia. She uses a range of surfaces to create her work on from paper, canvas, walls and cars. She used a wide brush, roller and paint whilst creating these two narrow tall pieces, for her smaller scaled paintings she uses permanent marker pens, Indian ink, paint brush and are based on her own fantasy worlds inspired from everyday life.

Graffiti Spectrum

COI crew

he Cause Of Insanity crew, above from left to right are Vyal, Werc and Man One, who collaborated on this vibrant and detailed graffiti street artwork. One evening and one morning was spent by these artists, each with a style of their own in creating this seamless street art that merges their individual styles together. Werc was born 1980 in Ciudad Juarez and grew up in El Paso, Texas, started graffiti in 1992 and whilst graffiti is a major part of his life he also works with mixed media on canvas. He has exhibited at the Snite Museum, Museum of Monterrey, and has works as part of the Cheech Marin Art Collection. Man One grew up in Los Angeles where he developed his skills in street graffiti and love for art, he graduated with a Fine Arts Degree from Loyola Marymount University, has run Crewest G a l l e r y f o r t h e p a s t t e n y e a r s a n d h a s a l s o b e e n commisioned by drink, clothing and sportswear companies. See facing page for profile on Vyal and his extra solo piece.

Graffiti Spectrum

Vyal

os Angeles based artist Vyal AKA Jaime Reyes is also part of the COI crew, who at 6’ 5” had no trouble in creating this extra solo piece that in part reflects his views on the sense of light and his interest with circles, titled ‘Is this still a secret.’ Whilst growing up in Los Angeles there were always signs of gang graffiti and murals around him, he became aware of New York style graffiti around 1987 and wanted to create murals using spray can paint instead of paint brush. His first piece of graffiti was on the side of a bridge by his parents house, a silver and blue block letters piece that read WEN. He’s been doing graffiti for twenty years and his current style is dark psychedelic and surreal that he creates using freestyle spray can techniques whilst developing them as he goes along. He’s the original creator of the ‘Graffiti Saved My Life’ T-shirt, has his work on the side of trucks, the winner of the 2010 and the 2011 Estria Graffiti Battle, was commissioned for an event celebrating fashion designer Christian Louboutin, has collaborated with other artists around the world on big productions and creates canvas works for sale and exhibitions. His advise to anyone thinking of taking up graffiti is, “Have fun, keep an open mind, and don’t be afraid to try new imagery” he also wanted to say, “Thank you to Inkie and the See No Evil crew for all your hard work.” www.vyalone.com

Graffiti Spectrum

Cheo

rom Kingswood, Bristol, UK, he got into graffiti via the Hip-hop sounds played on the late John Peel’s radio show and from his brother’s drawings of New York skylines. It was also around this time that he used his own vinyl for a period of break dancing, then found a like minded group at Barton Hill Youth Club in 1987. After years of visually digesting the contents of Vaughan Bode’s cartoon strips, The Beano and Nutty comics he developed his own style of graffiti. Cheo’s work can be seen on the sides of commercial vans, shop interiors and shutters, home interiors and has published a colouring-in book for children.

Graffiti Spectrum

M City

City AKA Mariusz Waras, was born in 1978, Gdynia, Poland and went to the Academy of Fine Arts in Gdańsk. He made his first piece of street art graffiti using chalk to create a skull on his grandfather’s garage. He’s one of the stencil wizards in the world of graffiti, creating industrial scaled scenes strongly influenced from abandoned shipyards from his neighbourhood that can be seen in Warsaw, Gdańsk, Berlin, Paris, Budapest, Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Bolzano, London and Prague. For this piece Mariusz found himself harnessed to the end of a truck mounted boom lift, with boxes of spray cans and his rolls of carefully cut stencils for three consecutive nights and early mornings.

Graffiti Spectrum

Soker

oker is a Bristol, UK based artist who first started doing graffiti at the age of eleven with school friends. His first outlining for this piece ran over so he had to black it out and re-outline, he battled his way through the rainy patches and with the aid of a small crane and scaffolding completed his freehand spray can lettering of his name. Soker also creates his work on canvases for sale and exhibits his work.

Kashink

er name, Kashink, is an onomatopoeic word that she read in comic books as a youngster to describe the sound of something in action, and is instantly recognisable by the distinctively drawn on pencil line moustache on her upper lip. From Paris, she grew up in the Banlieus area, one of South Paris’s council housing estates and were she first saw graffiti, then whilst on a train journey into Paris also noticed the graffiti on the sides of the railway tracks. This has been her largest and most challenging piece to date because of its surface area and different types of uneven surfaces. Its four eyed male character with vibrant colours has almost become her trade mark, as it features in the majority of her works that can be found in France, the USA, Switzerland, Italy, Canada and other countries.

Graffiti Spectrum

Lyken

yken AKA Mark Lyken is a Glagow, Scotland based artist who grew up between Scotland and South Africa, has been painting since 1986 after initially being inspired by Hip-hop culture, the documentaries Style Wars and Bombin and the books Subway and Spraycan Art. He was also interested in the UK’s take on graffiti and the works of the Non Stop crew, London Giants, 3D from the Wild Bunch, SheOne in the 1990’s and is drawn towards the odder artists working within graffiti. As his work progressed he became influenced by cellular division and decay, bacterial spread and meteorological phenomena, as reflected here in these two pieces, made by using a selection of mixed media, including roller painting, spray can techniques and masking tape. Mark explained to me his process of working, “I make abstract work reacting to the space there and then so I don’t sketch before hand really, sometimes I will have a vague colour scheme in mind but mostly it’s a case of and picking up where I left off with the last painting. It’s more fun that way, painting without a safety net.” He also told me, “Unless you are prepared for a life of poverty and obscurity choose a less ridiculous way to spend your time. Remarkably, grubby and penniless artists aren’t that much of a turn on for girls. Who knew?” www.marklyken.com www.facebook.com/marklyken

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Sickboy

e uses a logo instead of a tag, is known for his own ‘Temple’ logo/icon, the ‘Save the Youth’ slogan, comes from a Fine Art background and was influenced by Picasso, Hundertwasser, architectural artist Gaudi and the street artist La Mano. From Bristol, UK, Sickboy moved to London in 2007 and soon got to work on stamping his mark around its East end areas of Shoreditch and Tower Hamlets, his ‘Temple’ logo/icon can be found on wheelie bins and have been valued up to £50,000.

Graffiti Spectrum

Roa

oa, who lives and works in Ghent, Belgium, is known for his range of scaled up versions of black and white animals on the sides of abandoned buildings, warehouses and caravans. A London council once threatened to paint over a three and half metre artwork of a rabbit that he had legally painted, but a campaign forced the council to change their minds. He uses a roller different spray can strokes and techniques to create the intricate details of his artworks that can be seen in this example of a fox. They can also be found looking around street corners in London, New York, Berlin, Warsaw and Paris.

Can Two, Seize, China Mike, Rich T, Zase and Mr Jago

Can Two

Seize

China Mike

Rich T

Zase

Mr Jago

Graffiti Spectrum

KTF and RAW crew

TF (Keep Things Fresh) and RAW (Read And Weep) are two crews that collaborated in a small area accessed via the stairwell under the footbridge in Nelson Street. The allocated area was restrictive to work in by pillars that support the elevated walkway, but this didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t stop them from creating individual pieces of lettering and characters by using a range of spray can techniques. They also put in an extra ÂŁ150.00 of their own paint as they wanted to do one of the side sections along the elevated walkway to represent more of what their crews can do. KTF and RAW crews come from different areas of the South West, UK and are in either one or both of the crews: Ryder RAW and KTF, Mr Riks RAW and KTF, Poster RAW and KTF, Molar RAW and KTF, T.Rex RAW, Sigh1 RAW, Silent Hobo KTF, Haka KTF, Lokey KTF, Ames KTF and Devas KTF. www.readandweepgallery.com

Elevated walkway side from left to right: Lokey, Ames, Silent Hobo, Poster, Ryder and Mr Riks KTF lettering: Mr Riks Staircase: Ryder

KTF lettering Mr Riks

Ryder

Graffiti Spectrum

T.Rex

Poster

Sigh1

Silent Hobo

Left to right: Lokey, Ryder, Devas, Poster, Haka, Mr Riks, Ames and Silent Hobo

Lokey

Ryder

Left: Mr Riks Back wall: Haka, Mr Riks, Ames, Silent Hobo, Poster, CK1 and Haka Right: Mo1

Poster

Haka

Mr Riks

Left: Mr Riks Right: Haka Graffiti Spectrum

T.Rex

rom Wiltshire T.Rex was the only girl member of the RAW crew. She first started doing tags on her way back from school and was inspired by the work of Mode2 and Bando that she had seen in the book ‘Spray Can Art.’ Her largest piece of graffiti was done in Savernake Park, Swindon, UK, of a 30-40ft long pink dinosaur. She uses emulsion, freehand spray can techniques and told me that she prefers doing graffiti when the weather is warm as, “It’s hard to paint when your fingers are freezing.”

Rows

ows AKA Hannah Rose Stewart had originally come down as a volunteer to help out with the ‘See No Evil’ event preparations. Then whilst on the site was provided with a small area on a narrow column on which to create a concept that she had been sketching out. She used the sketch of her cherub setting concept for reference, whilst using a combination of freehand spray can techniques, stencil and acrylic hand painting to create her piece that soon caught the attention of the nearby established artists.

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Skyline view

(from left to right) Conor Harrington, M City, (above) Nick Walker, (below) She One, El Mac

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Block Party

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Graffiti Artists Comments Wrec - “Sweet job.” Flying Förtress - “Big ups.” Manone - “Thanks! great pics.” Stik - “Thanks Francis, these are great.” Ryder - “Well documented, lovely shots.” Acerone - “Some really great shots there.” Dicey - “Hi Francis, thanks for those, they look great.” Vyal -“Awesome!! Thank you sooo much these look amazing!!!”

Graffiti Spectrum

ÂŠ Frank Street 2013 printed in England