ART | 5 SHOREDITCH GRAFFITI WORKS YOU DIDN’T KNOW EXISTED

The walls of London’s Shored­itch pop with col­our, mes­sages, pic­tures and tags. Shored­itch is well-known for its graf­fiti and street art — if you’re famil­i­ar with the area you’ll know there’s a num­ber of famed Banksy works, but really that’s just the tip of the ice­berg. If you want learn what some of these oth­er vibrant pieces are when you find your­self strolling through the neigh­bour­hood, then The Stage have help­fully put togeth­er a list of some of the less­er-know and harder to find street art works.

Juane — Mini Art

Loc­a­tion Address: 154 Brick Ln, Lon­don E1 6RU

Juane

Juane — Mini Art

Shored­itch High Street can be a hub­bub of activ­ity, from street vendors to musi­cians and shop­pers rush­ing about. So for this piece, you may need to take your time and look a little harder. On the corner of Bux­ton street and Brick Lane, at knee height are two clandes­tine rub­bish men, try­ing to hide from pass­ers by. This com­ic­al scene is typ­ic­al of Juane’s sense of humor when it comes to street art. Before becom­ing a street artist, Juane worked as a garbage man and real­ised that every­one seemed to ignore him, even in his fluor­es­cent jack­et. Being so vis­ible yet so hid­den is his visu­al joke. So keep an eye out for two very sneaky bin boys.

Dre­ph —  Myvanwy

Loc­a­tion Address: 49 Brick Ln

Dreph - Myvanwy

Dre­ph — Myvanwy

You can find this piece tucked away in Sev­en Star car park, which is just off Brick Lane. The Ghanai­an artist Dre­ph painted a series of por­traits called ‘You Are Enough’. These por­traits involved a num­ber of “amaz­ing women who are not giv­en the vis­ib­il­ity they deserve”. In paint­ing these beau­ti­ful, bright por­traits all over Lon­don he wanted to pay trib­ute to the women who do “extraordin­ary work for the bet­ter­ment of their com­munit­ies and soci­ety”. This large por­trait por­trays Myvan­wy, the dir­ect­or of cul­tur­al mar­ket­ing agency ‘Louder Than Words’ where she focuses on the vis­ib­il­ity of import­ant youth and com­munity programmes.

Lewis Camp­bell: No Evil

Loc­a­tion Address: 1A Heneage Street

After you walk out of the Sev­en Star car park, walk right and you’ll see the small side street known as Heneage Street. Tak­ing the corner, make sure to look down and you’ll see three wise mon­keys por­tray­ing: “See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil”. These three vibrant char­ac­ters have stood the test of time as they were painted in 2013.

Phlegm

Loc­a­tion Address: 16 Heneage St, Lon­don E1 5LJ

After see­ing Lewis Campbell’s piece, walk straight ahead and just behind the Rag Fact­ory is a mur­al of epic pro­por­tions. Over­look­ing a children’s play­ground, this play­ful piece is almost 3D in places as it cov­ers the building’s old chim­ney walls. Arranged with help from Globalstreetart.com, the piece was painted in 2012 after three days of work! Mak­ing use of the building’s height, the Shef­field based car­toon­ist and illus­trat­or painted his icon­ic mono­tone figure’s in boats and on stilts, mak­ing a grey, bor­ing alley way into an unmiss­able land­mark. He also refreshed the paint of the hopscotch in the play­ground, so why not indulge your inner child and play around?

Zabou Won­der­land

Loc­a­tion Address: 50 Middle­sex St, Lon­don E1 7EX

Zabou - Wonderland

Zabou — Wonderland

Off the beaten track, yet not far from Aldgate sta­tion, lies the The Bell pub with its entire façade covered by a beau­ti­ful Purple Zabou piece. The pub has com­mis­sioned Zabou on mul­tiple occa­sions to add a truly unique spin to their entrance. Zabou hails from France but has set her roots, as well as her paints, firmly in Lon­don. From the most well known piece ‘The Twins’ on Shored­itch High Street to this little hid­den gem. After a long walk around the east end, why not grab a pint while you admire it?

As street art is sub­ject to change and at the time of pub­lish­ing most of these pieces still grace the streets. How­ever, reg­u­lar repaint­ing and tag­ging means that some pieces are gone in a mat­ter of days, so we invite any­one who knows of more recent pieces to sub­mit them to us. Just click the ‘Add a Gallery/ Street Art Loc­a­tion’ but­ton in the bot­tom right-hand corner of the map.

 

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I Am Hip-Hop magazine welcomes contributions from guest authors. If you would like to review an event, please get in touch! iamhiphopmagazine[at]gmail.com