Sietske Hoekstra www. www.facebook.com www.twitter.com
Upfest - The Urban Paint Festival was conceived by some crazy art lovers back in the summer of 2008. Initially meant to be a small paint jam with a handful of artists, it quickly became a group of 50 like-minded folks wanting to show their skills off to whoever turned up for chilly day in October 2008. Upfest is now made up of four partners two of which are full time and about 100 volunteers whom without the festival could not take place. Upfest continues to work closely with Nacoa (National Association for Children of Alcoholics) a local charity with national coverage. Nacoa amongst other activity operate a free confidential helpline for children effected by alcoholism within the family, manned by volunteers the work they undertake is ultra vital in today's world. We are pleased to say that the festival has helped to raise over ÂŁ15,000 for the charity over the past three years and more importantly raising crucial awareness of such a taboo subject. Nacoa - www.nacoa.org.uk - Helpline No. 0800 358 3456
The Urban Paint Festival Upfest would like to thank Mark and everyone at P58 for the opportunity to show the history of Upfest (so far) and take a look at this years festival taking place on the 4th and 5th of June here in sunny south Bristol.
Our first festival, well we called it a festival but was really just a medium sized paint jam. After being inspired by Banksy's Cans festival in London, Supercans in Southampton and possibly a few too many goblin ciders the two founding partners in Upfest had a crazy idea to bring 'Live' street art back to it's home and have a little shindig in Bristol. After a bit of blagging (okay quite a lot) the good people at the Tobacco Factory gave us the venue... And the rest is history as they. Upfest'08 saw the likes of local legends, Cheo, Cheba, Lokey, Nik Ill and Inkie take out the main wall at the festival, from further afield we had K74 (USA), Goin (FR) make the trip for their first year and SNUB, Dank, Grafter, Ben Slow and Snik blindly travelling from across the UK to our wee paint jam. Massive respect to all artists that made the trip. So the festival finished, no major hick ups and god damn it the idea worked and the festival was truly born.
Upfest 11 . 4th & 5th June . Bristol, UK . www.upfest.co.uk