fuelling futures - street stencil art

@theleapbd

street stencil art

Along the streets of Bradford, you will see some new colourful street art. However, this is no ordinary artwork as you will see new portraits of some influential women in STEM and Motorsports. This collaboration between The Leap and artists STEWY and Martyn Johnston was brought out to iconise three inspiring women who made their career in STEM - Egyptian-born aerospace engineer Tahini Amer, British space suit designer Vinita Marwaha Madill, and British racing driver Jamie Chadwick. As part of the hugely successful Fuelling Futures campaign, the LEAP continues to encourage the young people of Bradford & Keighley to pursue opportunities and careers in STEM and Motorsports. The project is funded by Sir Lewis Hamilton’s charity Mission 44, which also aims to increase diversity within the motorsport industry.

Each individual shown has a thorough background and extensive knowledge in their field that is unlike any other. This includes Amer’s work with NASA on their Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) project, Madill’s “space suit design to protect astronauts from muscle and bone loss in space” and Chadwick’s position of Development Driver for the William’s Formula One Team. Each piece was made to be remembered as they are life size and use bright colours of red, blue and yellow to stand out. Tahini’s piece is located at the entrance to Bradford College as you walk in and is unmissable.

STEWY stated that “I made it life size for them to be relatable. With this method they can associate themselves with the work because it’s a reflection of them. It’s intimate.”

STEWY, a Bristol based artist that focuses on life size stencils of nuisance characters, is no stranger to Yorkshire or Bradford. With a creative connection going on twenty years, his previous work includes mural portraits of Alan Bennet in Leeds, Sylvia Plath in Hebden Bridge and in 2014 he incorporated non cyclists to appear on bikes in unlikely places during the Tour De Yorkshire for the Tour De France race. His work ensures that his art can be seen by anyone and everyone as “they’re not in galleries, they’re outside. They are accessible for everybody and there is no elitism about it.” With over seventy pieces of art scattered around the UK and internationally, STEWY’s pieces are unmissable.

Our other artist in question, Martyn Johnston, is a local artist to Bradford with a considerable creative background who is well known for pioneering the street art movement in Bradford, in link with Bradford 2025. Some of his related work can be found on Street Art City website which included work with BD Festival and working with international artists. He is also a talented scenic painter working as a set builder for theatre and TV. His role in this project was to find the various walls for the art to be showcased on and to short list them. This project was especially important to him as he feels that there is such a “strong background of science within Bradford” - a nod to its industrious history. He also started How Do Yorkshire which is an online journal of arts and culture of Yorkshire.

Therefore, if you find yourself walking around Bradford this summer, make sure to find these locations. The portraits might just brighten up the grey days we have in Yorkshire. Or even better, make you feel inspired to look more into these women in STEM and how you can get involved too.