We transitioned through Rhodes' history in four stages. From pre-colonial times, to post-colonial settlement, to industrialisation, and the current day rehabilated residential zone.
Three distinct colour ways. We chose the blue and gold option for the sense it gave us of shifting daylight.
History Train Underpass Mural
This gigantic 35x5m piece of public art was commissioned by the City of Canada Bay to tell the somewhat fraught history of the suburb of Rhodes in a way that was honest without being divisive.
Given the mural was to be applied to an underpass that runs below the John Whitton Bridge, named for a man who was very involved with the establishment of NSW railways, we decided to use the symbol of a train to take the public through the suburb’s changing landscape, from the pre-colonial era, to colonial settlement, to industrialization and the production of toxic chemicals, to its current day rehabilitated residential status.
The segmentation across the wall is not representative of the actual time span of these respective eras. I also thought it was important in an artwork representing historical periods through landscape and architecture to clearly represent that the land was not uninhibited pre-colonisation, and to depict the structures that the First Nations Peoples who inhabited this area built and used for shelter.
The style is different from my usual artistic style to take into account the method of application (spray paint) and story which is told through the use of a subtly shifting repeat pattern.
The artwork was designed to be best appreciated from a distance, as the council cited the potential traffic and safety hazard of people lingering inside the underpass trying to get a closer look.
Agency:
Paper Moose
Client:
City of Canada Bay Council
Producer:
Carl Tindall
Paint:
Krimsone & Scott Nagy
Street Art Murals Australia