A FLAVOUR OF SWINDON PAINT FEST 2024

We decided as the sun was shining that after Church we would go out and look at some of the paintings done for the Swindon Paint Fest this year and we were not disappointed.

This collage, showing 23 paintings can only give a flavour of the whole Paint Fest and over the coming months, I daresay I will be going around the streets of Swindon looking for more!

It was great to speak to some of the artists as they were working and they were all happy to chat to passers-by.  I guess a lot of eaves-dropping was done too, when we sidled up to the various artists as they were speaking to others.

I chatted to one lady, called Pei Pei from Malaysia, who was also taking photographs and we had a great chat so I showed her the shot I had taken on Friday and told her where to find it because she hadn't seen it. 

I also told her about Blip - well why wouldn’t I?  I gave her a note of my Blip page and she may even read this - thanks Pei Pei - it was great chatting to you!

Her boyfriend, Martin, said he only came because Pei Pei had dragged him along but I noticed he and Mr. HCB having a good chat.  Apparently, Martin works in one of the buildings behind some of the hoardings, but had never walked round to see any of the art work, and there is still a lot left over from last year’s Paint Fest.  In the second row of my collage at the right hand side, you will see I have left some of the buildings behind the painting, just to show that the surrounding area is quite built up.  
 
We wandered around for about an hour, promising ourselves that we would make other visits in the future.  As we crossed over the road, I saw a mural that had been painted on the side of a house at what was the Whale Bridge Roundabout on Fleming Way, next to the line of the canal that once flowed through Swindon.  You can see this at the top left of the collage.  The mural is taken from a well known photograph taken in 1904 of children standing on the two bridges built across the canal in the 1870s, dressed in their Sunday best clothes.  

The mural was commissioned to mark the centenary of the birth of Swindon’s railway poet, Alfred Williams, and painted by Ken White, Swindon’s famous mural artist, in 1976 and was actually his first mural.  Ken started his working life in Swindon's Railway Works as a sign writer and later went to Swindon Art College.  He repainted this mural in 1983 and again in 2009.  Ken's best known work was the “Scarlet Lady” painted for Virgin Atlantic, which became their logo.

I wonder if these new paintings on hoardings and walls around Swindon will stand the test of time like Ken White’s?  Time will tell, but they certainly brighten up our town and enable us to strike up conversations with total strangers as we view them.

Hope you all have a great week. 

P.S.  Should have said that the one with the big "M" says SMILE - I have put this in as an extra - hope you all manage lots of smiling this coming week!