Stirling’s first street art festival was held on the weekend of September 22-23 with The Cube project, launched as part of the Animating Our Streets initiative.
The Cube, organised by street artist Mia McGregor, is a project meant to encourage creativity and interactivity by offering Stirling residents and visitors the chance to decorate a series of eight cubes which were dotted across the city centre.
From Kilted Kangaroo to Thistles Centre, from the Arcade to Friars Street, the multicolored cubes lured in hundreds over the course of the two-day event, as each passerby was encouraged to leave his mark on the semi-permanent art installations they encountered.
The event also included pop-up entertainment spots across The Cube locations, with local up and coming musicians and performers bringing live music to the participants.
The Cube joins the thickening ranks of similar events which recently took place across the country, indicating that street art is on a sharp incline in the urban Scottish landscape.
The past few years saw the birth and rapid spread of street art festivals, graffiti jams, city-wide art projects and cultural initiatives that are gradually transforming many locations across the country. Aberdeen, for instance, saw the return of Nuart festival this September, following 2017’s extensive international collaboration, bringing large mural projects to major landmarks of the granite city.
Painted Doors Aberdeen is likewise transforming the city’s aesthetics via a group of artists’ vibrant makeovers of more than 20 abandoned doorways.
In Glasgow, meanwhile, over 120 international graffiti artists came together at the Yardworks Festival to transform more than 1000m of wall space into their signature artworks; and in Edinburgh, the Rock the Dock Graffiti Jam, which began this September, aims to create the UK’s longest graffiti wall at Marine Parade by gathering more than 60 local and international street artists to breathe some new life into the area.
Until recently, the famous psychedelic masterpiece of Kilburn Castle was the sole flagship of Scottish street art, but with the vibrant, contrasting bursts of colour which are beginning to dot local cities it’s clear that the artistic urban landscape of the country is alive and shifting.
Hi there. I'm Irina, a student/staff member at University of Stirling, studying English and Journalism.
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