Colourful Streets

Browse through this blog briefly and you will very quickly discover that I am more than a little bit in love with Latin America. I thought my love of nature would mean that I wouldn’t like the cities. I was wrong. This post aims to celebrate the thing that persuaded me to love the cities… the stunning urban art I saw throughout my trip. There are so many more photos, but these are just a few of my favourites from CHILE, ECUADOR, COLOMBIA, BOLIVIA, EL SALVADOR and GUATEMALA…

CHILE 

Valparaiso

Valparaiso is a port city with a difference, about 2 hours from Santiago on a bus. I’ve never been anywhere so abundant with colour.  I spent 3 days getting gloriously lost in the maze of steep cobbled streets, refusing to believe I needed to take the funicular.

The place is brimming with artists, poets and painters who could be seen working on nearly every corner as I trekked around.

 

The streets are brimming with their work. Paintings are on every street and stairway.

People will paint everything they can find…

Vistas are one of the things that make Valparaiso so popular and the higher you climb the more beautiful they become. You also get a sense of the scale of some of the art work.

 

Santiago

The capital city of Chile is not short of an artist or two either. Barrio Brasil is well known to be area where you can stuff your eyes full street art. I stayed in Barrio Bellavista and collected these beauties for my memory banks…

 

As I left to go for a bike and wine trip of a vineyard, this lady had started painting at the end of my street. As I stumbled back to my hostel after, trying 2 rose, 3 whites and 2 red, I noticed that she’d finished and it looked just as I wanted to look when I was younger. I always wanted blue hair…

 

The Chilean urban artist INTI has also done two murals in the centre of Santiago. I’m not certain, but I think they are meant to be a bit like Ekeko dolls, which are traditional dolls in Bolivia, Peru and parts of Chile. They are covered with all the items you can imagine you need to live a happy, fulfilled life.

 

Ecuador

Quito

On the way up to the Parque Itchimbia on the hill to see the view of Old Town Quito, I came across a very large mural…

 

Otovalo

The main draw of Otovalo is the incredible market, but look around and there is lots of free stuff on the walls as well…

 

Colombia

Bogota

Bogota is a truly excellent place to see a lot of street art. I went on the Grafitti tour (http://bogotagraffiti.com/about) which gives just an introduction to the enormous amount of the art there is here by well known artists such as Stinkfish and Bastardilla as well as many others who come from all over the world.  There used to be a war between the law enforcers and the artists. However, following the death of a very young artist who was shot by the police, the street art is now tolerated in Bogota and the place is bursting with colour.

 

 

It’s not just paintings that make up the street art in Bogota. Sculpture is also common, including absolutely loads of these masks.

 

Cartagena

 

Bolivia

Potosi

Images from the mining town.

 

El Salvador

Santa Tecla

Not all the art work is on walls. This indigenous face was created on a stone in the city by artists, Yuri and Patty.

 

A tradition in El Salvador is to create these pictures on the floor using coloured salt. People stay up all night to create them. You can see more in my other post here…

In Suchitoto these stencilled artworks can be found on many houses. They are part of a campaign against domestic violence.

 

Guatemala

San Pedro, Lake Atitlan

This was the first place I went to study Spanish with my good friend Amy, and an introduction to the world of having pictures on street.