Weston walls Upfest expands with resort trail
EUROPE’S biggest street art festival has arrived in Westonsuper-Mare – to bring a new colourful mural trail to the seaside town.
For the first time, Bristol’s Upfest is expanding its roots to the coast with the exciting new street art project.
Upfest has teamed up with local artists, Culture Weston and Weston Town Council, to present Weston Walls, a street art trail of 10 large scale murals which will appear on buildings across the town centre in September.
The initiative has been funded by a £20,000 grant from Weston Town Council and with support from the Government’s Culture Recovery Fund to Upfest.
A further £15,000 has been secured from Arts Council National Lottery Project Grants to enable a series of local commissions and a programme of engagement activity with local schools and community groups.
The new Weston Walls mural trail is being curated and produced by Upfest and will form part of a permanent trail transforming the town’s streets with colourful new artworks.
It is hoped the trial will encourage people – who flock to Bristol for the city’s annual Upfest celebration – to visit the seaside resort.
The programme will bring together local, regional and national street artists who will paint a series of artworks during the first three weeks of September.
It will see 10 new murals created, adding to the existing street art and murals painted by the likes of local artist Martin Darcy.
The trail will feature new work from a diverse mix of artists including Irony, Hazard One, Dan Kitchener, Farrah Contemporary, Jody, Tozer, John Curtis, Damian Nicholson, Andy Council and Shruti Ashish.
Each will paint one-off designs in their own inimitable style at a variety of locations around the town centre.
Locations for the murals will be announced as each artwork takes place.
Upfest co-founder Steve Hayles said: “We are excited to bring a flavour of Upfest to Weston-super-Mare where the artworks will not only transform local sites and engender community spirit, but bring people from near and far to the town.
“We want to say a big thanks to all the funders for making this initiative possible, to the landlords for providing their buildings as creative canvases and to the artists for leaving their unique street art stamp on the town.”
Upfest in Bristol launched in 2008. In its first year around 40 artists took part but this has grown over the years and now more than 400 artists flock to the city to paint.
The last Upfest was in 2018 which was followed by a fallow year in 2019.
Last year’s event was cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic.
This year’s ongoing Upfest in Bristol began in May, and has seen 75 walls painted in 75 days.
Culture Weston programme manager Tom Newman said: “We are thrilled to be collaborating with Upfest on Weston Walls.
“This exciting new mural trail will bring fresh street art to the town from a diverse mix of local, regional and some renowned national artists.”