Marley and Us
A crowdfunding campaign has been launched to Bring Back Bob by creating a new piece of street art (above) to replace the one lost as a result of the redevelopment of 180 Brockley Road (below). The work will be created as part of this year's Brockley Street Art Festival and delivered with the support of the Brockley Max team, who were behind the original mural. They explain:
Residents of Brockley, south east London, are coming together to launch a crowdfunding bid to bring back a Bob Marley mural that was lost during demolition for a new housing development.
The mural will become the centrepiece for the first ever Brockley Street Art Festival, which will take place from 29th May until 6th June 2015.
Festival organisers need to raise £5000 to cover artist fees, materials and equipment for this and other planned murals. They are appealing to art-loving Londoners to help through a crowdfunding campaign to be launched on 14th April 2015.
Brockley Street Art Festival was created following a successful public vote as part of an initiative led by London mural specialists Global Street Art and popular London blog Londonist. Organisers will work with local, national and international artists to transform vacant walls and shop shutters in the Brockley area.
Images of the musical legend, who would have celebrated his 70th birthday this year, have been at the heart of Brockley's arts-minded community for decades. The original mural of the reggae icon was created over 40 years ago. This was replaced in 2005 as part of a Brockley Max black icons cele-bration but demolished in 2014 along with artist impressions of Maya Angelou and Jimi Hendrix.
Established street artist Dale Grimshaw has been lined up to paint a brand new image of Bob Mar-ley, with organisers securing permission for painting just yards from the original mural site on a wall belonging to The Brockley Barge, a pub owned by JD Wetherspoon.
Richard Marriner, Area Manager for JD Wetherspoon said, “We are delighted to support Brockley Street Art Festival this year. These murals have been part of Brockley for 40 years and we are de-lighted to help the community preserve some of the artistic history from this area.”
Brockley Street Art Festival is being held in conjunction with established arts festival Brockley Max, an annual, community arts festival which combines music, art, performance and exhibitions. Brockley Max festival runs from Friday 29th May to Saturday 6th June 2015 in venues all over Brock-ley, Ladywell and Crofton Park, south east London.
Brockley Max festival director, Moira Tait, has been involved in numerous local projects that have represented artists in the local area. She added: "A Bob Marley image has been part of Brockley for so many years now so it will be fantastic to see it back again, and we are thrilled that the painting will begin at the Brockley Max Opening Night."
The full festival programme will be published at brockleystreetart.com and brockleymax.co.uk and will be released in due course.
While we're a massive supporter of both the Festival and the Brockley Max, we're not sure this is a particularly good idea.
To be sure, the original graffiti was one of Brockley's best-known and loved icons and its destruction was a sad day. But as many football managers can attest, trying to recreate past glories is usually a mistake.
We should celebrate Brockley's afro-Caribbean heritage, but we're not sure that Bob Marley represents it. A black hero with a local connection would have been a more powerful statement than to recreate an icon so ubiquitous that no backpacker can escape his lilt.
Click here to help with the fundraising.
