Fox Park Art Works – Bristol – CHANTELLE GRACE PHOTOGRAPHY

Bristol is known for it’s graffiti and street art, with the most famous graffiti artist being Banksy. On my usual walk around my local area, I noticed artwork appearing under an old viaduct, that for many years had been an unloved, forgotten piece of land, that had just undergone major network rail building works.

I enquired as to what art works were being done, and I was told by an artist that they were part of a project called Project Sprint, that was launched by Network Rail and Severnside Community Rail Partnership. Local artists, Peace of Art, Silent Hobo, Graft, Anna Higgie, Dave Bain and Zoe Power, were there to help produce artwork that aim to improve the condition and appearance of railway lines across the south west. They wanted to give the community of Easton a voice, and give a new lease of life to the area with colourful, bold artwork.

vibrant artwork at Fox Park viaduct in Easton, Bristol — Artists, local councillors and representatives from Network Rail and Severnside Rail Partnership with the new artwork. BBC.co.uk

Steve Melanophy, Network Rail’s community safety manager, said: “It’s really great to see members of the local community coming together to produce some fantastic artwork to improve the look of the local area”.

Heather Cullimore, Severnside Community Rail Partnership’s partnership manager, said: “It is very exciting to extend the new community artwork at Stapleton Road station by commissioning a set of murals designed to improve the aesthetics of structures at nearby Fox Park.“

Many people dislike street art and graffiti, and they think that it brings an area and landscape down, and makes it look hideous. Film Director David Lynch says “graffiti is ruining the world and making our planet ugly.”

Jonathan Jones from TheGuaridan.com quoted “The vast majority of graffiti is ugly, stupid and vaguely threatening. A tiny portion of it is witty or creative… we have learned to put on a forced grin and tell ourselves it is the look of our time. Graffiti is a pretentious subcultural backbeat that is replicated everywhere in much the same style, the same chunky lettering and coded messages. It is boring and expresses a generalised contempt for community, kindness, and the weak… After all it is so blatantly hypermasculine, aggressive and destructive of people’s desire for a decent environment.”

I agree and disagree with their views. I really enjoy street art and graffiti, so long as it is done tastefully and not just silly meaningless tags that have been done by someone out for a walk with a spray can. I believe that street art can enhance an area and bring joy to your daily walk and why shouldn’t it. Why should we be forced to look at boring grey concrete walls and pavements everyday, why can’t people living in an inner city, be able to enjoy beautiful colours and artwork in our landscape. Living in an inner city means that we don’t have instant access to open natural landscapes, unless you travel out of your area and around the city or travel just on the outskirts of the city, to local natural landscapes. Communities want to see colourful inner-city landscapes. It shows that you care about your area, your community and the Bristol landscape. Bristol is also known for its colourful painted houses, in areas such as Cliftonwood, Totterdown, Montpellier, St Werburghs and Easton.

The Local's Guide: Cliftonwood - Visit Bristol — Cliftonwood, Bristol. VISITBRISTOL.co.uk

Google Street View shows the Fox Park viaduct before the artists painted it. It was boring, lifeless and dull. It also had a bad reputation for crime and antisocial behaviour.

Below are photographs that I took after the artists had completed their work. Although it was an overcast day, you can see a huge improvement. The space looks vibrant and friendly. I notice that when I walk past this area, many people tend to stop and look at the artwork, or stop to photograph it. When sat in vehicles that are queuing in traffic, people also tend to look at the artwork.

Aumairah Hassan, of Peace of Art, said: “Our mural was based around the voice of the community. Though most of us live locally and are part of the Easton community, we didn’t want to assume anything so we created a survey for locals to take part in so that we could genuinely reflect their voices and favourite things about the area through our artwork,”

Sophie and Rob Wheeler from Graft said, “For our pillar we were given the brief ‘bringing communities together and supporting diversity and inclusion’. We came up with the theme WOVEN – weaving together elements of pattern design from the different cultures which have intertwined to create what Easton is today….we hoped it would give the area a new lease of life”.