Dynamic art trail transforms city centre for BRIT awards  

Local illustrators have turned Manchester’s streets into a music themed open-air gallery ahead of the Brit awards this weekend.  

To celebrate the BRIT Awards on Saturday, six talented illustrators – all Man Met graduates – were chosen to help transform the city centre into a spectacular gallery.  

Stanley Chow, renowned artist, launched the citywide trail project to celebrate Manchester’s vibrant creative community in the build-up to this weekend’s BRITs.  

From the concept of love and singer Olivia Dean’s latest album to the suffragettes and rock band Amyl and the Sniffers, the installations were all inspired by Manchester’s cultural roots and by this year’s nominations for the iconic BRITs.  

Taking place for the first time in Manchester, the 2026 BRIT Awards will see thousands of fans flocking to the city’s Co-Op Live venue for the main event on Saturday, and to the city’s Northern Quarter and Ancoats areas this week to take part in the specially curated art trail. 

Jessica Lee, full-time freelance illustrator and Manchester Met graphic design graduate, was one of the artists chosen by Chow to create a large-scale installation for the trail titled ‘The Art of Loving’, which is now on display in Lever Street. Inspired by the BRIT nominee Olivia Dean’s album of the same name, the colourful installation explores the concept of love.   

Lee said: “I wanted to capture the many different emotions of the album through my character work. Each heart character represents a different emotion. It explores how love comes in so many different forms. I think her album is a beautiful reminder that love is all around us and in the current state of the world we could all use a bit of love, spread a bit of love and try to find joy in the little things of life.”  

Feminism and Manchester’s suffragette movement were the inspirations behind illustrator Barney Ibbotson’s bold billboard takeover titled ‘U Should Not Be Doing That’.  

With a direct reference to BRIT International Group of the Year nominees Amyl and the Sniffers, Ibbotson’s dramatic Peak Street piece links Emeline Pankhurst and Manchester’s suffragette legacy with lead singer Amy Taylor’s loud and unapologetic feminism.

Ibbotson said: “I pieced my artwork together out of all these different elements and there are lots of symbols. 

“I added the arches of the Free Trade Hall along the bottom where the Women’s Social and Political Union used to have their meetings. At the top you’ve got modern day Manchester with the high-rise buildings, so there’s a bridge between the ages.   

“There are more references to the suffragettes with the tricolour flag they used to fly, and the toffee hammers they used to smash windows as an act of disruption.” 

Florence Burns, an Illustration with animation graduate from Manchester Met, created a piece titled ‘DISRUPT’ depicting a high heeled shoe on a drum foot pedal.

She said: “DISRUPT emerged from thinking about visibility and who has historically been centred within music culture. It’s a tribute to the women and non-binary people (past, present, and future) demanding to be heard and taken seriously against male-dominated power structures – and those with intersecting identities who face even more bias.”  

Other large-scale illustrations in the trail created by impressive illustrators include famous Mancunian pubs, detailed planetary forms and a lyric from rock band Wet Leg, among other rock-inspired imagery. 

The Brits Art Trail is taking place around Manchester’s Northern Quarter and Ancoats and will be in situ until Monday 16 March. View a map of the trail here