Thursday 30 June 2011

Little House...

Today I made a little house, and here it is in my "garden":


Also, I have spent my afternoon putting all of my Driftwood Accessories (plus dimensions) onto their own tab within the menu bar! Please excuse the shadows and blue backgrounds, it's been pretty stormy in Brighton recently...

Thursday 23 June 2011

Text imagery.....

Over the past few years I have come to appreciate text. Nothing spectacular and in fact maybe the more simple, the better, but here are a few I've come to love:


Another Como image. I think this reads "always drink Coca-Cola". This advert seemed quite out of place but I like it's basic structure and the fact that the scaffolding poles are evident. I almost feel like the sign should light up in neons at night but I think it's just a plain white sign!


I'm not sure who would name their boat "Lets Av Sum", but I really like the brazen text! This was taken on a very miserable day by the seaside in Eastbourne a few Sundays ago.


Lewes is the name of the town that I lived in until I was ten and now that I live in Brighton I like to go back there, especially if I can walk over the Downs to get there! Whoever wrote this obviously likes Lewes too! 


This building is about two minutes away from where I live and has been empty ever since I have lived here, but recently it's been undergoing renovation so I thought I'd best take these snaps before the text is gone forever! I love it when you can still see text even thought the lettering has long gone. This building must have been empty for years and years.


Love the font! Another Como image.


In a similar style, another example of Italian graffiti! I assume that "glue" is a tag?!



"Post No Bills", the first taken in Belfast and the second in New York a few years later.


Some lovely Brighton graffiti for you.


Little man on the back of a cat undertaking graffiti in East London?! 


A slightly weathered "zoo" sign in Belfast.  I love the peeling paint and foliage growing from the "z"!


It is more the man that appears to be walking on a surf board than the text that I like in this one! Taken in a really tasty ice-cream parlour on the Isle of Wight.


I am a massive fan of fairy lights and so this image taken in Hong Kong of the harbour tour sign brings a smile to my face with its rainbow colours!  I'm not sure why but I really, really like light!

"Back-blogging"............

Is it socially unacceptable to "back-blog" (talking about something that is very old and something that you would have blogged about back then if you had one)?.

I'm going to go for it and show you some of my favourite photographs, some recent and others years old...


I absolutely love this image of pigeons, taken by the canal in East London. It is absolutely massive in scale. I think that the pigeons themselves were done on paper and then glued to the wall, with the blue outline added in afterwards. I really love pigeons, I can thank my friend Ryan for that, they have beautiful colouring. The polaroid-like images in the background work really well (I assume that this is either coincidence or clever placement!). I'd love to show it bigger than this but it doesn't work!


A wall of tags in East London, taken during one of my graffiti research trips during first year MA. The first character in the main blue tag reminds me of a dripping ice-cream cone!



These two images were sent to me by my friend Ian when I was looking a lot at street art during my MA. I believe that they were taken in Headingley (Leeds) where a man has been making and placing paper boats/ hats in wall gaps and crevices for years.


Strictly speaking, this isn't a favourite. It's one of my own pieces, a bit of an off-shoot from another piece, but there's something humble about the orange bricks against the little green detail (rolled up industrial waste) that I really like.

The following three photographs were taken in Italy (I lived in Como for three months during 2007 whilst doing an internship and I loved all of the graffiti that exists there):


I'm not sure who this little man is but I used to see him every day on my train trip to work and I think that he's amazing! So jolly to look at, dancing away to his tunes!


Possibly a slightly creepy image of a man, but it draws me in.


Not graffiti this time! There's something about the angles in this photograph that attracts me. If I remember correctly it was taken in Lecco (the other "foot" of Lake Como, along with Como town) on one of many exploration trips during my stay.

Two Italian images taken by an old friend of mine who always made me envious with his photographs:


Notice how most of these Como pictures are red?! I love the smoothness of colour on this wall, and the great chunks of wood that make up the door.


This image was taken in Como town, a really beautiful and rustic area with lots of charm. I love the way that newspaper has been put behind the grate and I like the tag that I hope says "pint".

Back to the hearts....

I used to absolutely hate hearts (I'm not a girly-girl) but now I'm more accepting and thus I tend to see them in a lot of things; the shapes of leaves, odd bits of material on the floor and sometimes driftwood too. This piece I found on the beach yesterday and was too good not to photograph, especially after my first post of hearts:


Another heart related image, given to me by a friend many moons ago after we went on a trip to London, I was annoyed not to have seen the piece myself. I think it was taken in a cafe:

   

A very relaxed heart spotted in Milan during the Furniture Fair, I love it's worn away appearance:


Okay, I didn't realise how many images of hearts I have lurking in the depths, here are a few more:


When living in Italy my house mate and I were pretty stunned when our margheritas come out looking like this...


A gate somewhere near Como, Italy.


Another simple Italian heart.

Wednesday 22 June 2011

My two favourite walls in Brighton....

The two following images are from walls I walk past on almost a daily basis and I can't help but look at them as I totter past:


I think that this is the painted imprint of a man's body, squashed against the wall, with his cheek pressed into the bricks. I can't imagine under what circumstance this was done but I absolutely love it! I really like the positioning of his arms. I don't know why I love it so much, but I really do. Every time I see it's still there I'm thankful that I can keep enjoying it.


I'm not sure why this piece intrigues me either. Maybe once again it's the ephemeral nature, I know it will be painted over soon enough (it's on the way to Asda and these walls have a pretty high "turnover" when it comes to graffiti!). I think that perhaps I like how raw it is? I also really like the drips..

Tuesday 21 June 2011

My very first post....

I first thought about doing a blog two years ago but didn't think I really had anything to say. However, over the past few weeks I have decided that I have enough images and thoughts that I actually want to share, so a blog is the way to go! Plus, I keep seeing things out and about on my adventures!

I'll begin with a photograph that I took today. Some hearts that I have been working on over the past few days: