Birmingham Street Art - More than Just Banksy

“It’s A Brum Ting” has been the signature of the past fortnight as Birmingham hosted the Commonwealth Games. So what is it about Birmingham, why is it so great? Armed with a cheap cheap day return rail ticket I set out several weeks back to discover what Goldie, Trevor Francis and Banksy (might have) appreciated about the UK’s “Second City” (tm).


Justin Sola, Void One & Mose78


The art started right outside the train station, FokaWolf was well represented as was Brummy staple Tempo, of whom more later.


FokaWolf



Tempo 33


Gent 48 is a giant of Birmingham’s street art scene so perhaps it was either fitting, or just inevitable, that the first mural spotted was by Gent48, painted in January this year when Birmingham was sorting out the torch relay for the opening of the Commonwealth Games. The mural features Haseebah Abdullah, England's first hijab-wearing boxing coach and Salma Bi, who founded the first all Asian women’s cricket team.


Gent 48 feat: Salmi Bi & Haseebah Abdullah


The one flag planted in my vague, unplanned plan was to locate Birmingham’s 2019 Banksy. Tick the box, complete the set. The route took me through a cluster of architecturally fascinating buildings. London by staid by comparison, so many planning luddites have ensured our post war rebuilding really lacks the surprise, flair and modernism a waddle around the centre of Birmingham will reveal. The interior of the Birmingham Library is so worth exploring for its design as well as its exhibition content.


Birmingham New Street Station, Alejandro Zaera-Polo



Birmingham Library Centernary Square



Birmingham Library Interior


The route to the Banksy had already been mapped out by the Charm Bracelet trail by Mick Thacker and Mark Renn.


Birmingham Jewellery Quarter Charm Bracelet pavement plaque trail, Mick Thacker and Mark Renn


What’s to say about the Banksy on Vyse Street. Great placement, great use of the street furniture and a poignancy likely to rise as rampant inflation and fuel poverty drives up homelessness next winter. It is well preserved and thankfully no gallerist twat has laid his grubby “Preserving street art for private collectors” hands on it. So far. It’s a pig to photograph clearly and parts of its execution are a tad indifferent.


Banksy "God Bless Birmingham"



Banksy "God Bless Birmingham"


Banksy confirmed this stencil as genuine with a website message saying "God bless Birmingham. In the 20 minutes we filmed Ryan on this bench passers-by gave him a hot drink, two chocolate bars and a lighter - without him ever asking for anything." - Banksy


Banksy "God Bless Birmingham"


Arriving in Birmingham I expected graffiti; thanks to an awareness of its recent history of street art festivals I expected murals; I wasn’t fully prepared for the brilliant explosion of sticker art. Every lamppost, traffic light, street sign and pole had been claimed by sticker art, one of my favourites being the huge variety of brace faces by Tempo who we used to see fairly frequently in London 10 or so years ago.


Tempo sticker montage


When Tempo was up in London our main delight was his large circular non permissioned paste-ups so finding a number of larger spraypainted murals was a pleasure.


Tempo 33



Tempo 33



Tempo 33


Other sticker artists included Wreck1, Lisk Bot, Never A Servant, the legend Fokawolf and a very impressive scattering of the playful and rare (to me at least) street art of Pahnl.


Pahnl



Werck1, Lisk Bot



NVRASIR



Fokawolf and Titty



Pahnl



Pahnl


Birmingham embraces adventurous and exciting architecture but the ancient brick and steam midlands’ post-industrial relics co-exist alongside the modern. Graff was popping up in some breathtaking spots and with more canals than Venice (Brummies say), canal-side vistas in particular are worth hunting out.


Birmingham & Fazeley Canal



River Rea Birmingham



Farmers Bridge locks



Digbeth River Rea



Smokers by canal


The urban huddle of car parks, streets and old factories in Digbeth just to the east of the city centre forms an amazing gallery. It is dominated by amazing murals, some appear to be permission murals liable to change, some look like relics of street art festivals with tags acknowledging “City of Colours” (2014 - 16) and “HighViz Festival” (2019-21) as well as our perpetual favourite – get up and get away with it.


Gent 48, Ziner



Goldenboy 924



Lisk Bot



Ziner (below) TBC above



Drop Burners Not Bombs Gent 48 Ziner



Ziner



Ziner



Broken Fingers



Cryola 1



Peaky Blinders, Aske P19



Philth



Inkie



Cryola 1



Gent 48



Philth, Never Ready


Paste-up action in the vicinity was fairly limited, the paste-up hall of fame hunt will have to wait till the next visit.
Foka Wolf, Void One


Chance plays a key role in street art spotting in a city you haven’t explored before. There is the chance of what artists are “up” at that moment; your experience, your sample will possibly or probably be completely different to that of anyone else before or after. Also, what route do you take across the urban spider web of streets, alleys and paths? From A, B may be sought by going right then left; or you can turn left then go right, that’s two different street art galleries right there. While slaloming through the mainly industrial streets from Digbeth back to the train station, a glance over the shoulder into an open door revealed a delicious collection of political and tribute murals inside a fortuitously empty car park.


Void One memorial tribute mural to Arthur Labinjo-Hughes, Astro (UB40) and Captain Tom



Gent 48, Ziner The Brolly Works



Theresa May by Title



Two faced Jeremy Hunt is NHS Joker, Void One



The Brolly Works



Malcolm X and Martin Luther King by Title


A good street art city should house a collection which is too vast for you to cover in your limited time, especially on a one day visit. It should also have change, renewal, vibrant health and life and Birmingham’s street art scene has both of these. It is hard to put it better than Birmingham’s own Prince Of Darkness when Black Sabbath reunited last Sunday (Paranoid starts 1 min exactly) for a spine tingling surprise set (BBC iPlayer, certain areas only, go to 2 hours exactly, next 3 months) at the Commonwealth Games closing ceremony.

“You are the best…..Birmingham for EVVVAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH”

Links:

Gent 48 instagram

Ziner instagram

Tempo 33 instagram

Banksy Website (please tell Banksy you found him through Graffoto.co.uk)

All photos: Dave Stuart

Hit Shot Walls May 2013

All photos: NoLionsInEngland


May was a busy month for street artists and photographers of street art. London has been blessed by visits from a plethora of overseas street art stars, let’s start with a few shots of work by an artist new to us, Dede who is reported to come from Israel. Dede’s paste ups were all nice, original and well placed but specially noteworthy were the huge quantity of evidently handmade (screenprinted?) individual stickers


DEDE



DEDE


Also from Israel, regular recent visitors Unga and Tant of Broken Fingerz crew popped back to Shoreditch recently to paint some naked chicks on bikes with big handle bars stuff. It’s what decaying disused doorways are for really.


BROKEN FINGAZ


The international invasion turned intergalactic with the arrival of Space Invader, whose Earth base is in France.


SPACE INVADER


SPACE INVADER


London always welcomes Belgian artist ROA and this month he obliged with two of his finest large scale murals. One located on South Bank must by dint of the nature of the tourist spot and also the heavy traffic on passing railway lines be in with a shout of being his most eyeballed ever, while the other in a grim alleyway is far from the beaten track for anyone other than winos, junkies and street art photographers.


ROA



ROA (detail)


DALeast and Mrs DALeast, herself more commonly known as Faith47, arrived to decorate various walls around Shoreditch. DALeast ran a cheeky little competition for the first 50 people to photograph all 7 pieces he did in London, the twist being the 7th one is located on private property behind locked doors and I can testify that a polite knock earns a frosty reception, so no image here of that particular holy grail.


DALeast



FAITH47


Yola is another artist previously unheard of who visited London and put up some large scale paste-up. Whilst this particular wall has been running for far longer that is healthy in an active street art scene, we weren’t impressed with the lack of respect in papering over this DScreet/Cept collab on Bacon St. On the other hand, this may possibly be a symptom of the pressure on space these days with so many spots reserved for curated/permissioned street art.


YOLA over Dscreet



YOLA


South Coast native Shuby visited London and revealed a complete potty-mouthed approach to letterpress paste ups though frankly who’s surprised, surely you remember the “knickers” portraits from a couple of years ago?


SHUBY


Early in the month we located a cluster of Lad stickers by The London Police but the star find were these custom kicks done in “get your chems here” boots over the telephone wires style.


THE LONDON POLICE


Not all invasions were intergalactic, Kid Acne brought a fresh wave of his Bouddica referencing Stabby Women to various front doors.


KID ACNE


At some point local hero Benjamin Murphy did this stab through the heart though we only found it in May so it qualifies for this months’ HSW.


BENJAMIN MURPHY (artist formerly known as AD/SO?)


An all too infrequent visit to Hackney Wick for a whistlestop shutter clicking frenzy yielded a cluster of ballerinas by spraycan impressionist and rude tagger Neoh.


NEOH



NEOH

Many London graff photographers have got used to popping in to the Kings Court car park to photograph the high spec spraycan artistry available there on a fairly good turnover. However, about 6 months ago the moody bastard on the gate who I always made a point of checking in with said "no photographs on weekdays, punters don’t like it; weekends only”. More recently this became "no photographers at all", a point reinforced with a laminated notice displayed at the gate. You can take spray paint into the car park but not camera lenses???? Cue our community’s applause and general mirth at Malabrocca’s huge fuck-off notice directly opposite. Apart from the dig at the car park proprietor’s, there is of course the irony that documenting the art breaches its prohibition, ho ho.


MALABROCCA


MALABROCCA


We have been hugely impressed with Jonesy’s use of street art to promote environmental awareness and score political points. This seemingly unique piece appears to show an over-furry figure with a stunted tree growing out of his head squatting behind a begging bowl, so while we like the art its meaning has us a little baffled.



JONESY

Aida’s fluorescent cheebra’s, half zebra, half cheetahs have been popping up in a few locations, curiously they always seem to yield good photo opportunities which reflects good placement.


AIDA


I mentioned this was a busy month for photographers what with 2 street art photography shows and a debate on the nature of the incestuous relationship between street art and photography, there is also the small matter of the Street Art Photography Workshops which I want to brazenly plug here. The essence of the idea is spending about an hour talking through tips, hints and ideas for photographing street art with the aid of a slide show then to go out onto the Shoreditch streets to play with the wide range of opportunities for street art phototgraphy. The feedback has been pretty awesome and the workshops continue. Check HERE for updated news and schedule. Plug over. For this time.