The Land is Calling…London Street Art

When I first lived in Shoreditch the area was well known for street art. It was before street art became a mainstream phenomenon (and before this blog was born to recount our time living in Bolivia), so I never really paid much attention to the policemen in riot gear with bright yellow smiley faces that decorated a nearby railway bridge. Or the drizzled line of white paint that I followed into an alley off Curtain Road to find a cocaine snorting policeman.

I regularly passed by the girl releasing a red balloon on Provost Street. The rat holding a placard saying ‘Go Back to Bed’ in Smithfield made me laugh as I passed by it on my way to work. The two rats holding a rocket launcher on the South Bank opposite the Houses of Parliament seemed like they understood the public mood better than those elected to represent us. The point being, these were all artworks by Banksy.

In the days before people would splash millions for the right to own what was until then free to view, Shoreditch was an open air Banksy gallery. So it was weird to be on Hoxton Street and see some Banksy’s covered by plexiglass to prevent them from being stolen. Maybe it’s a better fate than that of the balloon girl, who was painted over by a building owner with a chronic lack of imagination, but it still doesn’t seem right.

Banksy is probably still the most famous of street artists, and every time a new piece of work appears on a street there’s a race to either steal it or save it. In East London, where he came to prominence, he seems less relevant. A shame, but maybe it just reflects the transition from street art to investor art. Not that East London lacks street art quality or quantity. A walk around our old neighbourhood reveals a dynamic scene.

Whitechapel – especially the area around Brick Lane – has always been a canvas for an ever changing street art scene. It’s fitting for an area that has seen waves of immigrants establish communities here over the centuries. Huguenots fleeing religious persecution in France arrived in the 17th century, Irish immigrants fleeing famine and persecution in the 19th century, and Eastern European Jews in the 19th and 20th centuries. All had an influence on the area.

It is the post-Second World War Bangladeshi community that forged the current identity of the area. So much so, it’s been nicknamed Banglatown. It’s a vibrant and fascinating area to revisit, even if the queue of would-be influencers has made grabbing a quick salt beef bagel at Beigel Bake a near impossibility. At the Whitechapel Road end of the lane is a fabulous piece of street art celebrating Bangladesh’s 50th anniversary of independence in 2021.

The Land is Calling by British-Bengali artist Mohammed Ali Aerosol, is a short distance from the brilliant artwork by London-based French artist, Zabou, depicting Audrey Hepburn holding a white tulip hybrid created and named for her in the Netherlands. Born in Brussels to a Dutch baroness mother and English banker father, the street art is based on a photograph of her by Yousuf Karsh in 1960.

You could spend all day exploring street art around Brick Lane, but across east London you barely have to try to uncover interesting art. Along the Regent’s Canal there are numerous works, including a bright pink bear doing a decent impersonation of a furry. The creation from a childhood memory by British artist LUAP, the bear can be spotted all along the canal. Another street art hotspot we visited is Whitecross Street.

We were in the area to visit a friend who recently moved into an apartment in the iconic Barbican Centre, but it is also close to where we used to live. Today’s street food market is worth a visit, but so is the fact that in the 17th and 18th centuries this was one of the bawdiest and most criminal areas in London. This was the home of Priss Fotheringham, the ‘second best whore in the city’, after all. Who wouldn’t want to explore that history?