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[00:00.04]Lying on London's famous Millennium Bridge,

[00:04.72]British artist Ben Wilson paints on a piece of dried gum.

[00:09.92]It has been crushed flat into the ground.

[00:14.64]"The important thing is the gum is below the metal tread,"

[00:19.16]said the 60-year-old Wilson.

[00:22.20]"The beauty of it is they're all different shapes and sizes...,"

[00:27.72]he continued, describing pieces of gum.

[00:31.52]Wilson sees possibility in things most people avoid looking at.

[00:38.00]The flattened gum is a chance

[00:40.56]to turn a piece of waste into something beautiful.

[00:44.76]The artwork also is a way to surprise walkers

[00:49.64]and get them to take a closer look at the path they are on.

[00:55.56]"By painting a picture which is so small,

[00:58.64]those that see it then discover

[01:01.40]a hidden world beneath their feet," Wilson said.

[01:05.40]Back in his north London art room,

[01:08.84]Wilson paints on the surface of a small mosaic tile.

[01:14.08]It will be part of a collection

[01:16.84]that he is creating on the walls

[01:19.52]of London's Underground train platforms.

[01:23.36]The images are more personal

[01:26.24]than the chewing gum works, Wilson says,

[01:29.84]and represent a kind of "visual diary."

[01:34.00]"The pictures are a celebration of my life

[01:37.88]and those that I care dearly about," he said.

[01:41.96]"They are a process of visual inquiry -

[01:45.44]trying to make sense of the world," he added.

[01:49.80]Wilson was born in London to artist parents.

[01:54.68]He remembers working with clay from the age of three.

[01:59.96]He had his first art show when he was around 10 or 11 years old.

[02:06.24]He began making sculptures

[02:08.32]and large pieces for display in nature settings.

[02:12.88]Then his interest turned to waste, also called trash.

[02:17.96]He has been painting gum and other pieces of trash for 19 years.

[02:24.36]The top surface of the dried gum is not subject

[02:29.04]to local or national laws.

[02:31.28]As a result, the dried gum surface creates a space

[02:36.52]where Wilson says he can paint

[02:39.20]without damaging public property.

[02:42.24]"I found this little space where I could create a form of art

[02:47.16]where I could be spontaneous

[02:49.52]and do something which evolves

[02:51.92]out of the place in which it's created," Wilson said.

[02:56.64]Government officials have removed

[02:59.32]much of the artist's public street art.

[03:02.44]But the hundreds of gum paintings on Millennium Bridge

[03:06.76]remain for all to see.

[03:09.24]I'm John Russell.

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Words in This Story

gum – n. a type of soft candy that you chew on but do not swallow

tread – n. the raised surface that people walk on

mosaic – n. a decoration made by pressing small pieces of colored glass or stone into a soft material that then hardens

tile – n. a usually flat piece of hard clay or other material that is used for covering walls or floors

diary – n. a book in which you write down your personal experiences and thoughts each day

clay – n. a heavy, sticky material from the earth that is made into different shapes and that becomes hard when it is baked or dried

spontaneous – adj. created in a natural and often sudden way