History

All of my childhood years were spent skateboarding on the streets of Bristol. Undoubtedly this helped to develop a creative outlook on the world around me - a low wall becomes a rail slide, a tree stump that has raised a paving slab becomes a jump ramp, modern architecture becomes a challenging obstacle to ride on...

Even when it rained i lived skateboarding. Hooking up 2 VHS video recorders with scart leads so we could rip copies of the latest videos was a winter hobby... 

Curiosity lead me to see if anyone had uploaded my favourite clip from the New Deal video - Whatever! and there it was. Just as terrible a copy as i owned 15 years ago - but the style of Ron Knigge is still just as inspirational. I spent days trying to recreate the trick he does at 2:04...

Mr Colston

A couple of night shots grabbed on the way home from meeting my best man - a study of Edward Colston in Bristol City Centre...

Flow.

Recently I have found myself uploading a photo I have taken onto this blog and then heading straight over to Flickr and uploading the same flick there – without changing much of the text or adding anything new. Having just enjoyed reading some text on Knautia’s blog (highly recommended for a slightly more candid approach to the wider spectrum of Bristol graffiti) I thought that perhaps I should use this blog as a more text-based outlet. I did have the intention to do this but you know how it goes…

Anyway, with that in mind I’ll reply to one of Knautia’s recent posts, which I found to be an interesting view on this weekend’s UPfest. I guess the reason it struck a chord with me was down to fact that whilst painting my own piece at the Tobacco Factory I didn’t occur to me to link my piece with Don to the left or Grease to the right. Despite having had a chat and a laugh with Don (respect due!) I made a decision to leave a white border between pieces to make my piece stand out. Simple graff mentality I guess, but after reading Knautia’s post I wonder whether something more subconscious was going on.

The question of how much of the ‘flow’ (of graffiti artists working collaboratively) is cultural to Bristol I find intriguing. I know that personally, I have always painted with other people from the very first tags to the full-scale burners. Out of these experiences comes camaraderie and in my experience sometimes even brothership. For me it has allowed me to get to know some of the best street artists in the city/country/world on a personal level - and this always helps when you are painting with them.

But working together is a fundamental graffiti ethos in my option. Talking thing over with other writers, discussing styles, composition, colours, shading, 3D – all of that stuff is what makes you progress, you learn form others, you share ideas. You produce new art. I think the ‘flow’ of graffiti art is born of people just doing graffiti and is not intrinsic to Bristol. Its just that we are quite good at it ;-)

Bboy Ooze Des Portrait @UPfest

Bboy Ooze Des portrait painted on the boards at the Tobacco Factory, Bristol as part of the UPfest yesterday...

Cheers to all who stopped to say hello, take photos and the kids who asked for my 'autograph' - Honored!

All Roads Lead to the UPfest

Get yourselves down to the UPfest today - starting at The Tobacco Factory and on towards the Grain Barge... Dont forget your umbrella.

Bboy Ooze Des

Painting in progress...

Back to the Bridge

Show Closes

The door closes on the Friend and Co Acerone show...

More soon though at the Spotted Cow on Thursday 11th June from 6pm

Shop shot

Embarrassingly, Tom at Friend & Co managed to grab a better flick of the gallery than i have done...

So i nicked his.

Its up until the end of the month and open on Saturdays. If you want to pop in sometime contact Friend and Co and they'll arrange a private viewing for you...

Acerone - Friend + Co prints now available on-line

A lil heads up for y'all...

The prints I recently made for the Friend and Co show are now up on the Friend and Co web-shop ready for your shopping cart.

Suspension Bridge Mono - £25

A black ink on white heavy weight art paper, screen print of the Clifton Suspension Bridge. Taken from the orginal artwork I produced for the 4 colour screen print version released earlier this year. Credit crunching price for anyone on a budget! Signed, numbered and stamped by myself...

The Arches photographic giclee archive print - £40

This is a super high quality giclee print on the thickest of heavyweight papers. It is the original photograph I took of the Arches (Gloucester Road, Bristol, UK) and within a stones throw of the Friend and Co Gallery.

The canvas in store was painted using this photograph as a reference, and the Arches screen-print was made from the canvas. So this particular print is the original photograph/artwork that the further images were taken from.

Notice the blue streaks that flow into the centre of the image - these were created from a Police car that had just stopped me whilst taking photographs. I was asked what i thought i was doing in the middle of the road - i asked if they could assist my photograph by banging the siren on for a bit - amazingly they were more than happy to help! The blue flashes are the result of some friendly helpful neighbourhood Police.

The Arches 4 colour screen print - £80

The screen printed version of the canvas, printed by Paul Weston of Screen One on heavyweight Lustralux black glossy paper.

All are from and edition of 50

Some canvases and other originals are also available in store. Contact Tom Friend via the Friend and Co website to arange a time to pop into the shop and take a closer look.

We have a (re)opening evening this Thursday 14th as last week we were rained off and had to disappear early to catch Malakai support the Doves down at the O2 Academy - sorry to those of you who did turn up late and missed us... Hope to see you Thursday for a beer and a chat.

:-)