Bristol Resists Mural Launch
A new semi-permanent artwork created in collaboration with Tanith Gould – a local mural artist and member of Bristol Mural Collective - and the local community has been unveiled outside the People’s Republic of Stokes Croft building on Jamaica Street.
The mural is currently on display outside People’s Republic of Stokes Croft on Jamaica Street and will move on to Trinity next month to be displayed as part of Garden Party II on 18 September.
"This project has given people a platform to discuss issues they care about whilst also connecting them more deeply to their own beliefs and morals" - Tanith Gould
The mural, titled ‘Bristol Resists’, was created as part of a month long series of workshops teaching elements of mural design to the immediate community as part of our two-year long project, Art of Resistance, exploring 100 years of protest and activism in Bristol.
The mural was commissioned as piece of community art - made up of ideas from the public and around 50 participants over 3 workshops - featuring placards directly inspired by their submissions - to be displayed publicly across Bristol.
To create the mural, Tanith delivered a series of creative workshops, with the aim to provide a platform in which people were able to come together to discuss areas of social, political and environmental injustice and create a powerful piece of protest art in response.
Visions of Resistance launched at Trinity’s Garden Party back in May with a mural workshop. Participants were encouraged to think of artistic responses to the five research strands of the Art of Resistance project - Reclaiming the Environment, Women’s Equality, Counter Culture, Anti-Racism/Anti-Fascism and Working-Class Equality. These responses were expressed through a mix of mediums including collage, paint and printmaking.
The initial workshop at Garden Party was then followed workshops focusing on printmaking and collaging. These workshops encouraged participants to develop on the themes of protest and activist art with sessions focusing on printing radical imagery, slogans and lettering to make placards that represented social causes that resonated with them personally.
Tanith collated placards created during the workshops as well as illustrations representing significant moments in Bristol’s protest history such as the toppling of the statue of Edward Colston and the Bristol Bus Boycott to produce the final mural which represents a broad range of activism in Bristol over the last 100 years.
About Art of Resistance
Art of Resistance is a two-year National Lottery Heritage Funded exploring 100 years of social activism, protest and civil disobedience in Bristol and the art that underpinned each movement.
