Photo By Gail

On my recent vacation in London, we spent one day exploring the streets of an area called Shoreditch. In addition to being the home of Brick Lane, which is famous for its excellent Indian restaurants, Shoreditch is widely-known for its abundance of fantastic street art. To give those in NYC an idea of what it’s like, imagine if Freeman Alley ran the length of Avenue A. You could spend a full day there and not have to venture very far off of Brick Lane and it’s many side streets to find some the most creative and memorable street art imaginable. It is really quite mind-blowing and the day turned out be highlight of my trip.

One of the first significant works I spotted is this bright pink portrait of a woman with an elaborate braided hairstyle, set against a black brick wall with a thin band of blue sky behind her eyes — which definitely recalls the work of Surrealist Rene Magritte. This mural turns out to be the work of artist David Speed, who is renowned  for his Neon Pink, hyper-realist murals of people and animals.  Considering it is still quite pink, I’d guess it went up in either late spring or early summer of this year.

The Pink Lady, as I call her, is located on Ebor Street — an alleyway that appears to be one of Speed’s favorite outdoor canvases, as his Instagram reveals that he puts up new work in this same spot on a reoccurring basis. Who knows, by the time you get around to investigating, there could be something else there entirely! One thing’s for sure though, if it’s a work by David Speed, it will be super cool (and Pink)!