Street Art in Melbourne - Public and Government Responses

Public and Government Responses

The proliferation of street art in Melbourne has attracted many supporters and detractors from various levels of government and in the broader community. In 2008 a tourism campaign at Florida's Disney World recreated a Melbourne laneway cityscape, decorated with street art. Victorian Premier John Brumby forced the tourism department to withdraw the display, calling graffiti a "blight on the city" and not something "we want to be displaying overseas." Broadcaster, writer, media maker and festival director, Marcus Westbury, countered with an assertion that street art was one of Melbourne's "biggest tourist attractions and one of its most significant cultural movements since the Heidelberg School".

Some street artists and academics have criticized the State Government for having seemingly inconsistent and contradictory views on graffiti. In 2006, the State Government "proudly sponsored" The Melbourne Design Guide, a book which celebrates Melbourne graffiti from a design perspective. The same year, some of Melbourne's graffiti-covered laneways were featured in Tourism Victoria's Lose Yourself in Melbourne advertising campaign. One year later, the State Government introduced tough anti-graffiti laws, with a maximum penalty of two years in prison. Possession of spray cans, "without a lawful excuse", on, or around, public transport became illegal, and police search powers were also strengthened. According to Melbourne University criminologist, Alison Young, the "state is profiting from the work of artists doing it, but another arm of the state wants to prosecute and possibly imprison (such) people." Since laws were tightened, local councils have reported a "spike" in vandalism and greater incidences of tagging on commissioned murals and legal street art. Adrian Doyle, founder of the Blender Studios and manager of Melbourne Street Art Tours, believes that people who tag have become less considerate of where they put their tags, for fear of being caught by police, and are "paranoid so they are taking less time - tags are less detailed". In 2007, the City of Melbourne started the Do art not tags initiative—an education presentation aimed at teaching primary school students the differences between graffiti and street art.

Some local councils have accepted street art and have even made efforts to preserve it. In early 2008, the Melbourne City Council installed a perspex screen to prevent a 2003 Banksy stencil art piece, named Little Diver, from being destroyed; however, in December 2008, silver paint was poured behind the protective screen and tagged with the words: "Banksy woz ere". In April 2010, another stencil by Banksy, also painted in 2003, was destroyed—this time by council workers. The work depicted a parachuting rat and it was believed to be the last surviving Banksy stencil in Melbourne's laneways. Lord Mayor of Melbourne, Robert Doyle, said: "This was not the Mona Lisa. It is regrettable that we have lost it, but it was an honest mistake by our cleaners in removing tagging graffiti." The loss of these, and other, famous street artworks in Melbourne reignited a decade long debate over heritage protection for Melbourne's street art. Planning Minister, Justin Madden, announced, in May 2010, government plans, involving Heritage Victoria and the National Trust of Australia, to assess street art in key locations throughout Melbourne and for culturally significant works to receive recognition for the purpose of preservation. Examples of street art pieces that have been added to the Victorian Heritage Register include: the 1983 mural outside the Aborigines Advancement League building, and a mural that was painted by Keith Haring, in 1984, in Collingwood.