School Tours: Melbourne Street Art & Graffiti

OUR Melbourne street art and graffiti tours have been experienced by hundreds of primary, secondary, tertiary and international students. Tours are normally two hours for schools and leave from Federation Square but can be adjusted to group and school needs. Adult group tours (non-school) are 2.5 hours.

LEARNING OUTCOMES AND ACTIVITIES:
EXPLORE Melbourne’s famous street art and graffiti in the city’s labyrinth of lanes. Don’t miss seeing one of the most exciting and radical art movements in the world. It is happening right NOW! As Banksy said: ‘Australia’s most significant contribution to the arts since they stole the Aborigine’s pencils’.
VIEW different art forms -stencils, paintings, writers, paste-ups, yarn-bombing, lightboxes, installations and mosaics by amazing artists and learn the differences.
IDENTIFY local, interstate and international artists.
PUT UP and keep a piece of  creative street art in the tradition of street artists Mini-me and Slinkachu
DISCOVER the history and architecture of the painted industrial walls, buildings, and lanes.
MAPS are provided so students can return with friends and family.
STARTING POINT: We normally start from Federation Square  www.fedsquare.com.

SEE: BOOKINGS AND PRICES  

SEE: OTHER SCHOOL PROGRAMS – Explorer, Federation, Colonial, Indigenous, Early Melbourne, Architecture, Literature, City Discovery and more.

FORMS of Melbourne street art seen on our tour include:
Stencils: Transferring images to a surface with spray or roll-on paint using paper or cardboard cut-outs.
Paint: Most artists or writers use paint as their medium using hand-held spray cans.
Sticker or paste-ups: Creating an image or political or other message using homemade stickers and posters.
Mosaic: Using smaller parts or pieces, to create a larger piece of art.
Graffiti Writers: Highly stylised street names
3D: Three dimensional pieces or objects adhered to walls.
Installations: Using objects and events to create a wide variety of art sculptures and art objects including neon signage, events and video projections onto surfaces.
Typographies:  Historic signage, posters, advertisements, neon from the past all tell a story.

Our students doing street art in Melbourne Lanes

WHAT IS STREET ART?  
Street art is a controversial and democratic form of public art. This public art is described as ‘Street Art’ when permitted by authorities. Without permits, this art is regarded as illegal ‘Graffiti’ yet many of these illegal works are highly important creative and political pieces.  Many artists consider illegal graffiti as a radical endeavor that challenges the status quo and the concept of art as a collectable trophy. Yet outsiders to the art world may view Graffiti, particularly  ‘tagging’, as vandalism. We explore how this creative tension plays out as we walk the streets.

ARTISTS have played key role since the 1990s in bringing Melbourne back to life. The City initially used street art permits  from 2007 to support fantastic and imaginative colour and design by artists on unused or obscure walls with the consent of property owners. Annual public art commissions in the laneways have also encouraged a wide range of artistic experimentation.  In  2005 street artists from across Australia illustrated Hosier Lane for the film Ghost Rider. In November 2013, 100 artists, assisted by six cranes and curator Dean Sunshine, were invited to totally repaint Hosier and Rutledge Lanes for the huge ‘Melbourne Now’ exhibition  See article Street art continues  Melbourne’s history of local counterculture movements including the 1860s Bohemians, the Heidelberg School, Angry Penguins, Dadaists and the 1960s Drift.  

THE LANES The art is stunning but so is the spectacular setting in the lanes which have serviced the city since the Gold Rush. Industrial brick, bluestone and old infrastructure such as iron winches abound in what was once the manufacturing heart of Victoria producing textiles, furniture and manufactured goods. Other lanes were once the locations of bagnios, opium dens, impoverished communities and Chinese immigrants. We tell their stories as we go.

WATCH our video below!

BOOKS ON STREET ART

  • ‘Everfresh: Blackbook. The Studio and the Street 2004-2010? Miegunyah Press.S;
  • ‘Stencil Graffiti Capital, Melbourne’; J.Smallman and N.Nyman;
  • ‘Street/Studio’ by Alison Young, Ghostpatrol, Miso  and Timba Smits;
  • Kings Way – The Beginnings of Australian Graffiti. Melbourne 1983-93?.
  • Land of Sunshine. A Snapshot of Melbourne Street Art 2010-2012 by Dean Sunshine
  • Street Art Now, Melbourne, Australia and Beyond, 2010-2014 by Dean Sunshine

USEFUL WEBSITES AND ARTICLES