Bristol Upfest happened at the end of July this year, this is the tenth year of Upfest. Ten years ago, I remember hearing my ex-colleagues from when I worked in Bristol discussing visiting Upfest that year and for the next couple of years; I had moved out of that area at the end of 2007, so I never got to go to the early festivals but the community took a big interest in them from the first one. This year's Upfest is inspired by "The Simpsons", a cartoon comedy that has been running since the late 1980s. The creator of "The Simpsons", Matt Groening, choose three artists to represent his characters for Upfest 2018.
I have previously covered some of the larger murals from Bristol's Upfest 2018. Bristol-based street artist Jody painted , Nomad Clan painted #BeMoreLisa, Dank (Dan Kitchener) painted 'Ghost Cities - Bristol', and Rosk Loste painted a mural of a young lady. This post features additional street art and grafitti that appeared for Bristol Upfest 2018. This post only features the permanent pieces as I was not able to get to the event during the last weekend in July.
'The Simpsons' by Soker
Soker was one of the three artists picked by "The Simpsons" creator Matt Groening for painting the famous family on Bristol's walls at Upfest 2018. He is a grafitti artist based in Bristol. His work depicts a stylised grafitti-style version of The Simpsons family on their iconic couch in the living room which will be familiar to anyone who has ever seen the show or an image from the show.
Simple Bao
Simple Bao
Simple Bao is a Hong Kong-based artist and the second artist that Matt Groening choose as one of the artists to paint The Simpsons family at Upfest 2018. She creates freestyle colourful murals. I found two pieces that she created off North Street of various characters from "The Simpsons".
Nomad Clan are a duo of street artists; they are the third artist that Matt Groening picked to represent The Simpsons family. Nomad Clan painted #BeMoreLisa, a realistic-looking large mural on North Street with a young lady shouting from a speakerphone. The image of Lisa Simpson appears in the background, representing a role model. I covered this in more detail here: Nomad Clan painted #BeMoreLisa.
Angus
Angus is a Bristol-based street artist (Angus at Bristol Upfest 2018) who has been creating street art since 2015. His style is to use comedy and humour to send a message, and cartoon and video game characters do feature a lot. Although he was not picked by Matt Groening to showcase "The Simpsons", his work has commonly depicted them and other characters in the past, so it did not feel out of place. The above piece was one of my favourite's of this year's Upfest and depicts another character by Matt Groening - Bender the robot (on the right above) from "Futurama".
The London Police
The London Police are a duo of artists from England who started their street art career in Amsterdam in 1998, painting their smiley characters that they have become known for (known as LAD characters). These happy faces have been painted on a building on North Street.
Jake World and Unknown (possibly Angus?)
On the back of a sign, I captured a paste-up by Losthills Jake (originally covered here from paste-ups in London: Losthills Jake Paste-Ups Appear in East London). He puts the character in films or in the place of celebrities. I saw quite a bit of his work around the area, and I also saw a Bart Simpson made from plastic beads.
L7Matrix
L7Matrix
L7Matrix paints murals using bright colours and expressive lines. Birds feature a lot in his work, so these were painted at Upfest.
Cheo
One of Bristol's most famous street artists is Cheo, who paints bee faces and larger-than-life cartoon-style characters. I've previously covered the artist here: Artist Cheo Paints 'Shaun the Sheep' Mural in Bristol.
Annatomix
Annatomix is a street artist known for her geometry-style illustrations. I saw her at work in London previously and at a previous Upfest. This year for Upfest, she painted in Ebenezer Pocket Park in Bedminster.
Louis Masai
Louis Masai Painted a Mural depicting coral reef and ocean plastic pollution, which I covered more in detail in that post.
INKIE
INKIE
INKIE and Andis
Inkie is a Bristol-based street artist who paints sign or advertising-style murals with large typography and imagery. The street art is always eye-catching.
Boe and Irony
Boe & Irony painted a cat and mouse in a residential road in Bedminster, covered more in detail in the original post: Boe & Irony painted a cat and mouse.
Insane51
Insane51
Insane51 is a street artist from Greece. He is known for creating overlay-based art that can be seen with 3D glasses. You do not need the glasses to see the artwork, but it looks better through them I'm told. This is the completed work for a portrait of a woman, which turns to a skeleton X-ray effect in the background.
Caro Pepe
Caro Pepe
Argentian artist Caro Pepe creates characters with larger heads and faces to show the emotion of her work. Her main mural for Upfest is about women votes, which is a perfect subject for this year marking 100 years since women got the right to vote. This is also the theme that NomadClan used for their #BeMoreLisa art.
Jody
Jody, another artist from Bristol, painted a large-scale mural of a girl wearing a dog mask, covered here: "Little Gold Riding Hood". In addition, he painted a few smaller murals around Bedminster.
Lucas Antics
Lucas Antics is another Bristol-based illustrator who painted this witty rabbits on corded telephones. The mural looks much better seen straight-on instead of at an angle, but parked cars in front of it meant that I could not get a clear shot of the mural.
Ant Carver
Ant Carver is a London-based street artist, and I have covered his work many times, the most recent being Ant Carver Adds More Paste-ups to Sclater Street. His work features portraits that are usually completed in monotone with scribbles of colour over the top.
Stephen Hawking by ARCY Art
American artist ARCY painted a tribute for Stephen Hawking, the famous scientist who was also made famous because of his computer-generated voice. He passed away earlier this year, so it is a fitting tribute and a mural that certainly pops out.
Zabou
Zabou is an artist from France who is now based in London, and I enjoy seeing her work. She painted the above mural for Upfest, but her most recent work covered in this blog can be seen here: Villana and Zabou Collaborate on Amy Winehouse Street Art.
Nagel
South African artist Nagel creates urban mushrooms, and I saw some of his work installed in Bedminster. My most recent post about his work can be seen here: More Mushrooms by Nagel
Stewy
Stewy creates stencils of icons and animals; Bristol has a lot of his artwork or has seen a lot of his artwork over the years. I love the sheep above.
Roske Lost
I covered the above piece in more detail here: Rosk & Loste Upfest 2018
ChinaGirl Tile
German tile street artist visited Upfest last year and left a lot of her tile art; I think it was her first visit to Upfest. She returned again this year and pasted up several new pieces, including some major work in what is the largest amount of tile art I've seen in one place for her. The above rat is a tribute to Banksy, an artist who is claimed to have made street art mainstream. More of her work can be seen here: ChinaGirl Tile at Upfest 2018
Guy Denning
I've covered Guy Denning's work before, and his work also appeared at Upfest in the past. This new mural (sorry about the quality, but it was one I saw then forgot to walk across the street and take a better photo as I got distracted by the Tobacco Factory and the constant stream of cars to cross the road in this area). I've previously covered Guy Denning's work here: New Street Art from Guy Denning and Alex Face, Mau Mau and Bon
About Ponny
Ione Dominguez
Broink and Decimart
Michel Velt
Kowseone
Smok
Winged Fox
Piet Rodriguez
Andis
Yarn bombing
Diff
ENVOL
Loved Up - Tobacco Building
8mail
The Hass
Rob Wass
SAKEOne
Gage
I last covered Bristol Upfest in 2015, and you can see my post here: Bristol Upfest 2015. That year, I was in Bristol over Upfest so I managed to get a lot of photographs of the temporary artwork, but the larger murals normally do not get completed until earlier the week after.
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