Aug 05, 2025 · Episode 32
55 Min, 43 Sec 

Summary

What do silo art, classical music at train stations, and a council mural in a quiet suburb have in common? In this episode, Breallyn and Lyndon explore the subtle power of art in public spaces, and how public art and crime prevention have become unlikely partners in shaping the places we live. From revitalised shopping strips to the politics of “beautification,” they unpack how creativity gets used not just to inspire, but to influence.

With a healthy dose of skepticism and a few personal stories, they dive into the murky overlap between community engagement, urban design, and crime prevention strategies.

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Transcript

Lyndon: This just reminds me of when we’re kids and we learned what to do if we fell into quicksand.

Breallyn: Yeah. Yep. Maybe it’s like that. Yeah. I still know what to do.

Lyndon: I put some photos up on Patreon of our weekend away. Did you put, I must be unfit. All I’ve done is sit down and I’m huffing.

Breallyn: Did you put up the one that made it look like you were dancing a jig through the antique store?

Lyndon: I don’t know. So yeah, so that’s where we were on the weekend. It was good. Yeah, we

Breallyn: were we on the weekend?

Yeah. So Birdie had a camp essentially, which was why we got to go away as well. And we weren’t at the camp. We were at my parents’ place and Birdie was staying away from us. So that was something different.

Lyndon: And we talk about camping a lot. You bring it up all the time on this podcast.

Breallyn: I’m pretty sure that you are the one.

Lyndon: This always confused me when people would talk about going on camp and then they’re like staying in a suburban area. I think that’s not camping,

Breallyn: like staying. She was actually staying in a house.

Lyndon: Staying in a house. But they call it a camp,

Breallyn: it’s on camp, I guess when, it’s school kids, you, and they’re going away on camp.

I guess it’s a different meaning. ’cause it just means going away as a, group staying away from home

Lyndon: could be anywhere.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: Anyway. So that’s, where she was.

Breallyn: Yeah. What was the highlight of the weekend for you?

Lyndon: the barramundi was pretty good.

Breallyn: We have a favorite restaurant.

Lyndon: I caught it myself

Breallyn: down there.

Lyndon: There’s no barramundi down here that I’m aware of. So it must have Where do you reckon they shipped it in from Territory?

Breallyn: I’m not sure. Yeah, maybe.

Lyndon: yeah, that was really good. that is a good little restaurant.

Breallyn: Yeah, it’s great. We go there, the kitchen. We’ll give

Lyndon: them a plug.

The Kitchen.

Breallyn: The Kitchen. Down in Rye.

Lyndon: Down in Rye. Yeah.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: Tootgarook actually, which is where we met.

Breallyn: It is.

Lyndon: How’s that?

Breallyn: Yeah, we’ve got history down there.

Lyndon: It was a hot summer’s night

Breallyn: day.

Lyndon: Okay. I’m trying to make it sound more cinematic. It was a hot summer’s day, but, yeah, The Kitchen, right on the Nepean Highway there, Point Nepean Road, is that what they call it down there?

Breallyn: Yeah.

Vintage Shopping

Lyndon: Anyway, definitely worth it. We had a dinner there on Friday night and then we thought we’ll try their coffee Saturday morning and had to resist getting lunch there as well. And then I took you to my surprise, cause we were gonna go op shopping, no vintage shopping. It’s basically glorified op shops in big cold sheds.

Breallyn: I love some old crap. That is essentially why we always go in those places.

Lyndon: There’s some up market ones around the country, like The Mill is pretty good.

Breallyn: Yeah,

Lyndon: I think, I know if there’s one in Daylesford, I think there is, and there’s one down at Geelong.

There’s one in Ballarat, I think. Anyway, they’re a little bit up market, aren’t they? Those ones?

Breallyn: Yeah. There’s some that are more collated rather than just secondhand, thrift stores, junk stores.

Lyndon: Yeah. And they might have a good cafe attached or something like that.

Breallyn: that’s not what we went to or is actually the second one. ,

Lyndon: Yeah, the second one had that, but we got there half an hour before closing, so We had to,

Breallyn: I remember running through a big, shed trying to find a little stool and I failed to find,

Lyndon: yeah. We couldn’t find the things we actually wanted to find.

Breallyn: I recently did up a vanity table for the bedroom and just don’t have a stool for it. So everything else is finished, re vanished it and everything and put new hardware on it. But I need a stool and I didn’t find one.

Lyndon: Yeah, I found a jacket on the second, what do you call that? There’s a stall, I suppose and the very, the second stall I looked at had a jacket, which,

Breallyn: yeah. ’cause they’re made up of all different consignment stores, so different owners essentially. but it’s all in the one place. Yeah. And you just. Whipped on a jacket, looked around and there you were looking like a soldier.

Lyndon: I didn’t take it off.

Breallyn: Were you testing its warmth throughout the rest of the shed?

Lyndon: I was looking for security cameras.

So on our way to Tyabb where, there seems to be a lot of those secondhand vintage places. I was gonna take you to a little, surprise stop at a cider distillery I guess. it was a nice little drive.

‘Cause I thought, I just didn’t feel like going to one of those, there’s a lot of bigger, sort of corporate styled distilleries and wineries and things. And I just thought, let’s go to a small family run business. That’d be nice. it Was good when, Our son and myself went to Tasmania and we found that little distillery in the hills.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: Yes. So I like that experience. Yeah. And just talking directly with

Breallyn: special little place

Lyndon: the owner and

Breallyn: yeah,

Lyndon: find out a bit about, a bit about them and their history and their story. find that interesting. So I thought, oh, maybe we’ll do that. Got there closed. I’m like, why? How can it be closed?

Every, every literature, all the literature I looked up. I do have a bit of a history of getting things wrong like that though. But, anyway, so I rang them up.

Breallyn: We’ve discovered that. Yeah. Phone calls before we had out.

Lyndon: Yeah. I rang them up. We’re literally outside their place. I rang them up and they’re like, no, we closed for winter.

Breallyn: Didn’t say that anywhere on the website or whatnot.

Lyndon: If it did, I didn’t see it. Yeah. But that’s all right. We’re still a good time. We’ll go there some other time.

Breallyn: It was a little bit of a sad surprise, but we did get to go through the shed looking for stuff. Yeah, that was a nice getaway. All in all,

Welcome to Pain In The Arts

Lyndon: Welcome to Pain In The Arts.

You are here with Lyndon

Breallyn: and with Breallyn. I’m pretty excited because it’s finally happened. I have found a way to bring true crime into the Pain In The Arts podcast.

Lyndon: Is it about mushrooms?

Breallyn: It’s not actually, no. That’s, we’ve talked about this before. You and I tend to listen to different styles of podcasts, in our , just personal listening.

and one of the genres I do sometimes, with qualifiers listen to is true crime. So today’s topic is gonna be Art and Murder.

Lyndon: Ooh.

Breallyn: Yeah,

Lyndon: I’m listening

Why True Crime Appeals

Breallyn: I was thinking about true crime and why it’s even appealing at all. it’s, I’ve gotta, I’ve gotta say first up that I’m drawing a pretty thin thread from murder to art, but, hey, we’ve gotta go for it.

Lyndon: Why?

Breallyn: you’ll, figure it out. Let’s just say it’s a pretty thin thread that I’m drawing.

Lyndon: I feel some shoehorning is happening,

Breallyn: is really? Yeah.

Lyndon: Do you want me to go out and I don’t know, like maim someone or run someone over, so then you can,

Breallyn: no,

Lyndon: you can,

Breallyn: I don’t think that’s necessary for the podcast, but

Lyndon: allegedly.

Okay.

Breallyn: But I actually just wanted to talk for a couple of minutes on even why True Crime is appealing at all as a podcasting genre, but I guess overall as a genre, I don’t tend to read true crime books or watch documentaries or anything like that. I’ve not ever been interested in that.

I have struggled with my interest actually. And I’ve discussed it with my friends as well because we sometimes feel like, is it just voyeurism? Is it, are we using someone else’s tragedy as entertainment? ’cause that is,

Lyndon: Not if you’re listening

Breallyn: horrible,

Lyndon: but maybe the people that are, the people that are doing the podcasts are,

Breallyn: no ’cause it’s the audience that, consumes.

And I think that there’s certainly an element of that across the genre, like that there is that tendency to take, , somebody’s tragedy and yeah, it becomes entertainment. And obviously there’s a lot of, , shows and just art in general of movies and whatnot.

Sparked by that inspiration of horror and tragedy and, a bad thing happening to a real person.

However, if I ever start to listen to a new show or something and it feels like you are listening to somebody’s hardship and it’s just entertainment, it’s really a turnoff.

I, I literally just don’t, I can’t listen to it. It’s not what I’m there for. So I was wondering like, why am I there at all listening to some of these podcasts and, yeah, I think there’s a few things that do draw me to them. One of them is I don’t know, it’s almost like a, little bit of a safety briefing.

I know it sounds ridiculous, but if I can. Hear some, how some of these things went down. Maybe I can protect myself and my children.

Lyndon: This just reminds me of when we’re kids and we learned what to do if we fell into quicksand.

Breallyn: Yeah. Yep. Maybe it’s like that. Yeah. I still know what to do.

Lyndon: It wasn’t taught at schools necessarily, but we all seem to be prepared just in case it ever happened.

Breallyn: Yeah, I guess so. it’s, a similar thing to if you’re getting off a train at night and you’ve gotta walk to your car, have your keys out ready, A, as a weapon, and B, so you can get into your car as quickly as possible and then lock the door.

Lyndon: As long as they’re not already in your car.

Breallyn: No, don’t.

A lot of the true crime podcasts I listen to also have this sort of effect of bearing witness to somebody’s life if they’re done really well. , A lot of the victims of crimes like this are women. And a well-prepared podcast reporter will actually paint a proper picture of the victim as a person so that the audience kind of gets to know them and not just, the manner of their death.

So it feels for these victims who’ve had their life cut short and stopped by a predator, that those things that they did do with their lives, that had meaning for them, that you are, you’re hearing about those things and giving them worth and, understanding that person did those things, was that sort of a person in their life enjoyed, whatever it was they enjoyed.

And the life that they did have gets expanded and, celebrated in lieu of them actually being able to finish the rest of it as they would’ve liked to. So I, like that aspect of it. And my favorite podcast about this are also the investigative journalist ones, that are tracking cold cases that, the police for one reason or another have stopped investigating.

And I just wanted to mention Hedley Thomas from The Australian is like an absolute standout in this field, because when he investigates these cases, he brings such dignity and respect to the victims of the crimes. He’s done a few podcasts now that focus on women who have suddenly disappeared.

When no one’s been charged with their disappearance or their death, women who have just literally dropped out of life suddenly. famously he did Teacher’s Pet podcast, which resulted in, reopening of the investigation and a charge and conviction of Chris Dawson for the murder of his wife Lynette.

And to be listening alongside what’s going on and, hearing what , a criminal has tried to cover up and having that exposed to light having the victim acknowledged and seen and celebrated and the perpetrator, showing all the things that they did to try to get away with a crime.

I think that’s, yeah.

It’s you, it feels like you’re part of this search for justice in some way, so that’s, yeah. I just thought I’d tell you those things.

Lyndon: All I can think about is how his name sounds like it’s reversed. Should be Thomas Hedley.

Breallyn: Yeah, I have thought that before.

Lyndon: Investigate that. That’s what I wanna know.

From True Crime to Public Art

Breallyn: So what’s all this got to do with art? I hear you ask. Did you ask that?

Lyndon: my brain was asking, but it hadn’t got to my mouth.

Breallyn: I’m not specifically talking about murder today, but I do wanna talk about how art impacts crime and other social issues in local communities. today we’re talking about everyday occurrences where art impacts us and our neighbors.

Lyndon: That’s interesting. ’cause I was thinking, I suppose people have been killed over art. Yeah.

Breallyn: That might be a different podcast,

Lyndon: a different episode.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: And also, There’s obviously art being done about tragedies and about death and about murder.

Obviously not just paintings, but songs and poems, everything.

there’s lots of intersections.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: So I’m still confused about what your tenuous thread is.

Breallyn: today I’m talking about whether art can actually stop crime.

Lyndon: So you wanna turn us into superheroes?

Breallyn: Yeah. Oh, we are, we’re totally superheroes. I read,

Lyndon: I was reading a thing yesterday how art is, is a form, this isn’t new information, but as artists, we’re anarchists and as artists, whether we like it or not.

We are political just by the mere fact that we’re creating art and that the, that society is geared towards minimizing what we do because art can be so powerful and so the less we think of ourselves, the less art we’ll do and the better it is for a capitalist world.

Breallyn: Yeah. I like that idea and that’s it’s flip of what I’m talking about today.

So I reckon that’d be a really good thing to pursue as well, that, topic to talk about, yeah. How art can stir upheaval as well as calm the waters, so to speak.

Lyndon: Yeah. And it was also saying that, as consumers, if we’re just buying from the same big companies all the time, then that’s strengthening those companies. And the, and a good example at the moment of maybe, not wanting to support a company is, Spotify.

there’s a lot of people or there seems to be, more and more artists leaving Spotify over the involvement in AI weapons.

Breallyn: yeah.

Lyndon: There was also this line of thought, the more that we can be purchasing from small businesses and family run businesses and independent artists, that’s more of a grassroots mentality of community and building society up through that is a form of rebellion.

Interesting stuff. But yeah, it is, it is, like I say, the flip side of where you are heading with this episode.

Breallyn: Yeah. No, I think that would be good to explore for sure. Yeah, there’s a lot in that, what you just said. So yeah, it’s, there you go. Topic for next week.

Lyndon: I feel it’s too great a topic for me to,

Breallyn: maybe I’ll need to do some research.

Lyndon: To engage with.

Local Art Controversy

Breallyn: we have up the top of the hill where we live, there is an old homestead that was the original, homestead built by the settlers when they first settled this area. It would’ve been the very first house there. there’s actually two buildings.

One was like an earlier one, and then, down the track they built a second building there. So they’re very much, colonial style, fairly simple buildings.

Lyndon: Just, I’m, laughing because. When we were away, we watched a couple of episodes, a couple of sneaky episodes of Escape to the Country, and they get shown around to a house and they go, yeah, this is from the 18th century.

And or even older, some of ’em it’s more older. So yeah. When we’re talking about a homestead from the, settlers, what year do you reckon that was built in up there?

Breallyn: it was

Lyndon: what century?

Breallyn: it was the 20th,

Lyndon: probably the 20th century. It

Breallyn: would’ve been like, it would, yeah. I actually have looked it up before when that particular one was built early. I can’t remember, but Yeah. so

Lyndon: not that old.

Breallyn: Not that old. Certainly not old comparatively. But for the, for our area where, where McMansion City around here, that’s one all of our.

Cookie cutter houses are like around here, but yeah, this is , the old property and when it was built it would’ve been bushland everywhere. And then they would’ve just started clearing paddocks for grazing cattle and so on.

Lyndon: Yeah.

Breallyn: So it’s literally situated on top of the hill and, we walk up there all the time.

with Birdie. She loves to go up there and jump off rocks and stuff. And there’s the shops there, But, recently on one of these buildings, and it’s actually the little outhouse kind of building that is literally a toilet block.

Lyndon: I think it’s just toilet block.

Yeah. Yeah.

Breallyn: A mural has been painted. And you and I haven’t particularly been fans, have we?

Lyndon: No. I’ve probably thought about murdering someone over that mural. Look, it’s, or painting over it. Maybe that’s, maybe, that’s safer.

Breallyn: We just didn’t, we didn’t love the execution. ‘Cause it just looks a little amateurish really.

It looks like there’s a horse, a half a horse coming out of a tree that doesn’t look like it’s,

Lyndon: I also think that when you’ve got a public space like that, there should be some sort of discussion with the community.

Breallyn: there was, but let me, let’s describe the thing first.

Lyndon: how come I didn’t know about it?

Breallyn: Let me just describe a little bit about this mural. So in the background is a, some water, then there’s like a tree and then

Lyndon: the water is the ocean.

Breallyn: Yeah. Yeah, the ocean. Yeah.

Lyndon: Ocean waves.

Breallyn: So there’s waves and then out from the tree, it looks like a horse is jumping out of it, although.

Perspective wise, it doesn’t look like even if it had run in front of it, like the, horse doesn’t have a back, essentially, it just looks like half a horse coming out. And then there’s a woman standing in front of the horse in a red dress with her hand up in the air, and both her and the horse are looking directly at you if you stand in front of this, mural.

And there’s some other things, some flowers in the trees and some keys hanging down. And, there’s meaning behind all the things. But it was done as part of a community. Collaboration

Lyndon: and beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I remember. I, like, I personally don’t like it at all. And then I thought, I don’t think we’ll talk about this because, it’s subjective, isn’t it?

Breallyn: It’s very subjective.

Lyndon: There’s probably a lot of people that, that love it. And we can’t say it doesn’t belong there, but man, I would prefer something. Better there something that just looked like it belonged there.

Breallyn: Yeah, I think that’s,

Lyndon: and that was done really well. This isn’t done well.

Breallyn: Yeah. If it was executed better, it would definitely have gone a long way. But our sons walked past and gone, oh, that’s beautiful. I hadn’t seen that before.

Lyndon: Really?

Breallyn: And we were like, really?

Lyndon: he’s dead to me. There you go. There’s you.

Breallyn: No, he liked it, he liked it. yeah. But it was done in collaboration with,

Lyndon: Which son? The youngest or the

Breallyn: youngest?

It was a collaborative community project led by Arabic Welfare.

Lyndon: I’ll have to talk to him later.

Breallyn: all of the elements in this artwork have meaning. So for instance, the woman. Wears red.

So it’s color of energy and passion. And her stance suggests strength, and purpose, yada. So it’s, there’s every, little element has got a meaning. So it’s like a piece of artwork by a committee of people.

Lyndon: Committee,

Breallyn: yeah.

Lyndon: It reminds me of when you’re at school. And that’s exactly what happens when they open it up to, okay, we’re gonna do this thing, we want everyone to have input into it.

And then you end up with this hodgepodge kind of, less than artwork that has a meaning that only means something to that group of people. And it’s not, hasn’t got a universal sort of appeal.

Breallyn: Yeah. So it probably, it means something to those people that were in that group,

Lyndon: yeah. Which is completely valid. But

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: And that’s where I question why put it up though, like in a public space?

Breallyn: I guess they had a, spot for a mural if it was executed better, I would like it more,

Lyndon: Yeah. Yeah.

Breallyn: And I would also feel like

Lyndon: I’m a snob like that.

Breallyn: I understand what you’re saying about, it doesn’t connect, like it doesn’t look like it specifically belongs there. Like for instance, we’ve got some other nice art on old water tanks.

in the roads nearby us. And execution’s really great.

Like the art is, it looks really awesome and the colors are incredible. They depict scenes of wildlife or, like landscape. But they’re done in a way that stands out and yet also sits within the landscape. So yeah, it, it looks great and it’s like, why couldn’t we have that?

Lyndon: down at Rye, at the surf, not the Surf Lifesaving Club, but on the Front Beach.

So the Lifesaving Club? No, it’s the yacht club actually they have on their. I dunno if it’s a toilet block or if it’s their

Breallyn: building. Is it their admin building?

Lyndon: Yeah. Oh, I’m sorry. to the Rye Yacht Club.

Breallyn: It’s the actual club. It’s the clubhouse.

Lyndon: thank goodness they put a mural on it.

cause as a building it doesn’t speak much, does it?

Breallyn: I think it was one of those buildings put up in the seventies or whatever.

Lyndon: that’s the problem.

Breallyn: Yeah. Not much architecture.

Lyndon: Buildings around here that were done in the seventies. Most of them are quite benign and boring and plain and quite ugly. Yeah.

So they’ve covered it completely with a mural. And that mural is actually pretty good. it’s on aquatic. Themes and recreational activities on the water. Obviously there’s the turtle, obviously yacht, yachting

Breallyn: and windsurfer and yeah. So

Lyndon: it looks appropriate and as a piece of art, you definitely go, ah, that’s a mural.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: It falls into, easily falls into what it is actually.

But those ones that you’re talking about on some of the, water tanks around here Yeah. Some of them are quite stylized Yeah, they could be a mural or they could be

Breallyn: interpretation of a landscape.

Lyndon: Or they could even be, yeah, maybe they could be hung on the wall.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: But this one up that you’re talking about up at, The Homestead there, if it was done by school children. And there was a plaque there saying, this is from the local school kids and this is what it means. And that I’d go, oh, okay.

That explains the the execution of it if you like, but I still wouldn’t want it there. Yeah. Yeah. I’d go put it on your school. That’s fine. Don’t put it in this,

Breallyn: in our only public building really that

Lyndon: Yeah.

Breallyn: That we can walk around and Yeah. It’s a nice piece of land there that Yeah.

It’s lovely. Yeah. I know. demands attention because of the color scheme, which doesn’t really fit in with much else around. And does seem to Sit at odds with the site and the building, the, colors and the beautiful trees around

Lyndon: the history.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. So it’s odd.

Lyndon: You’re right. We should go there tonight, balaclavas, and a tin of paint.

How Public Art Prevents Crime

Breallyn: that’s the opposite to what. community art’s supposed to do, because I was looking into this that public art isn’t just about decoration. It’s being used purposefully as a tool for crime prevention and revitalizing community.

So it’s quite purposeful the way that art is used in public spaces. and this is, it’s part of an overall idea. Like it’s, a larger initiative about making public spaces safer and better for a community. So yeah, it’s been found art in public spaces, does have the effect of reducing crime albeit, within the con, I dunno,

Lyndon: Steve Albini

Breallyn: within the context of other initiative, like other parts of the initiative as well. So it works like this. The mechanisms of it mean that, where there’s increased visibility and natural surveillance because there’s more eyes on the street once the space is uplifted and activated, so there’s more people around which has the effect of reducing crime.

it increases community engagement and ownership because people start to appreciate the space that, looks good with a piece of art in it. And they start to take a bit more care of it, and it deters like misuse of that space. There’s,

Lyndon: let me tell you what I saw yesterday when I was walking around there, right next to that mural.

Breallyn: Yep.

Lyndon: I heard a bottle being thrown. I could hear that there was a group of young men that were meeting there and from what I could gather there was maybe an adult leader or someone who was

Breallyn: the gang boss.

Lyndon: No. It seemed like there was some perhaps robust discussion taking place.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: And then they must have had a bit of a break just as I was walking past I heard a bottle And I thought, oh, what’s going on there? So I turned around and then one of the guys picked up the bottle. He throws it at his mate and it smashes everywhere.

And the glass goes all over the path. it’s the One that is going through where the buildings are.

Breallyn: Oh yeah.

Lyndon: And where that mural is. And it’s a community center, so there’s all sorts of activities and things happen there and kids meet there and whatnot. Anyway, I just thought, oh, there you go.

That’s a blatantly, someone’s throwing a glass Bottle. It’s smashing everywhere. Broad daylight. yeah. So another example

Breallyn: of where the art has not worked. Yeah. For us. Yeah. I was just like,

Lyndon: gonna use that as evidence. The mural’s not working. Take it down

Breallyn: quick.

Get it off.

Lyndon: even though you haven’t finished, I’m going to preempt all of this and say Yeah. Great. And I can see how all this might be true. I just would like them to do it again. Put the same mural up if you want, but just do it better.

Breallyn: Yeah, I know it’s very personal to us.

Obviously it’s our, it’s our local spot where,

Lyndon: ’cause I walk up there, normally,

and, and I, use that area to just, reset lower my, my cortisol obviously exercise and also to keep my nervous system in check, all that sort of stuff.

Yeah. Getting some fresh air And now I go up there and I go, Ooh. And then I have to

Breallyn: Makes us furious

Lyndon: and then I have to deal with myself and go, okay, don’t be so petty. And and emotion comes up of like anger and Yeah. And despair. And I’ve gotta, address that rather than, so every time I’m like dealing with it every time I see it and go, no, that’s fine.

I guess that’s, it’s not for me. It’s for that small group of people that could easily have just, had it painted on a canvas and Yep. Hung it up in their space.

Breallyn: yeah. it’s certainly fostered dialogue.

Lyndon: I feel so petty

Breallyn: because Yeah. Which is one of the other benefits of art in public spaces is, having something like communal to discuss and.

Having that, connection point, so if ever you see somebody else up at the homestead, you can talk with them about what a piece of shit it is.

Lyndon: have you used your topic so that you can air all your grievances about the mural?

Breallyn: I haven’t. This was supposed to be like just one little. sub thing, but obviously we’ve, both thought about it a lot.

My point essentially was that like art in a local area has a powerful impact on community now. Yeah. Obviously we’re talking about this case not so great, but just in general. when a local council, decide to give space for art and an artist is able to do what they do and, execute that it can have such an.

Really Powerful impact on a community to the point that it actually does influence behavior and influences how people connect, how a space is used. It has impacts on health and wellbeing and emotional things. you’ve just described the effect of this mural has on your mental health when you see it.

If you were perhaps seeing something great up there, it would have presumably the opposite effect. Now we’ve actually, we know an artist, Kirrily Anderson, who, does artwork to this scale a lot of the time. this is one of her major. Things that she does with her artwork is big murals. She often does community collaborations and, gets involved, like teaches children, has, community groups and so on.

Do art with her. and she’s amazing and she does beautiful pieces.

Lyndon: her talent as an artist aside, I like the fact that she’s planted herself up in Northern Victoria in a nice little town up there. Very, small town. Yeah. But that she goes out and she collects what would you call it?

Breallyn: She really immerses herself into the environment, doesn’t she? And

Lyndon: she documents all the different sort of flora and fauna that is around, and then brings that back and incorporates those ideas and those colors and things into her artwork and into her murals. And so it’s all, there’s a real tie into to the land and to.

Breallyn: Absolutely.

Lyndon: The people that Yeah. That live there and so on. And anyway, so like

Breallyn: her color study’s just like on one stone or something. She’ll, have a look at it and be just so immersed in all of the different texture and color that she can absorb from that. And then that will, influence the next piece that she does or, will, be a study that she does for preparation for a certain piece.

And it, it’s amazing how much then that completed piece can really Yeah. Tie you back into the landscape and to the surrounds or, the idea that she’s presenting through that piece and, has the ability to have that emotional reaction in people that is the opposite to what we’re experiencing with our local piece.

Lyndon: I took a photo of our local mural sent it to her and said. What the hell’s going on? Something like, I dunno,

Breallyn: come back and rescue us.

Lyndon: I see. Can you believe this?

Breallyn: Yeah. the place at that art can have in urban development is, quite amazing and, can define a space and activate a space in a sense because it’s like the focal point to other things that can go on around it.

The Laundromat Experience

Now, we were actually part of something like this back in the day, many, moons ago. We had a laundromat. Do you remember?

Lyndon: Oh yeah,

Breallyn: we had a laundromat. we were the local,

Lyndon: we didn’t own the laundromat.

Breallyn: No. We were business partners with the owners,

Lyndon: so we managed it.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: Yeah.

Breallyn: So we would, luckily we didn’t actually have to get there.

Early every morning to open it. That would’ve been disastrous. But the milk bar owner next door would open up for us. He was lovely.

Lyndon: It was like two streets from where we lived.

Breallyn: Yeah,

I know, but, you weren’t getting up. And I had two babies,

Lyndon: not if the guy at the milk bar and open it for us,

Breallyn: but we did lots of work there.

We, did this thing up. And we,

Lyndon: I don’t remember a mural.

Breallyn: There was no, there was no There was no mural in there.

Lyndon: Ah.

Breallyn: But after we’d been there for a year or so, we got approached by. A little group who’d been commissioned to do up the street scape of that little group of shops.

It’s just a local little strip. There’s what, like

Lyndon: there was a fish and chip shop. A fish and chip shop weighed the chips. Do you remember that?

Breallyn: Yeah. Oh, we weren’t happy about that.

Lyndon: It’s come on now. A little bit of generosity wouldn’t go astray.

Breallyn: Yeah. Do a couple of chips over

Lyndon: if you wanted minimum chips, they would weigh it to the gram.

Breallyn: Wow. They didn’t even cook ’em well, so that was off pudding. Yeah. We never went there.

Lyndon: So there was that, there was a laundromat, there was a milk bar. There was, what else was there?

Breallyn: Was an op shop. There was pizza. There was a bakery at one. Yeah. Remember the op shop was great. Yeah. We used to go in to get the kids something and we had, our eldest was two or three at the time and when we were signing Getting the laundromat. I was pregnant with our second, so that’s how young in parenthood we were with that sort of thing.

and it was a nice little space. So it was Just behind the maternal and child health center where I would take the kids in to have their little checkups.

And then there was a little alleyway behind the, strip of shops. And then on the other side of the alley was the kinder where our oldest started going. So yeah, it was very much our local community. and yeah, we would walk down to work, take the pram down and so on. So that was really, good.

A nice little thing that we did back then. But we were approached at one point by Yeah. A group who was commissioned to. Do up the street scape in that little strip of shops because it was pretty boring and like it hadn’t had a, a facelift since the seventies itself. So they came in and the things that they did essentially included making better waste management with the bin system and the look of the bins.

they had fancy looking exteriors in the end. It was about greening the space as well, and art, and the, art that took place was in the form of these big sculptures that went on the sides of the end shops. So if you imagine the strip of shops, they’re all connected together.

And they ended up putting these sort of big, silver metallic. swoopy, swirly sculptures attached to the walls. And then through that they were growing like a vine, type plant that sort of, greened up that space as well as putting a few new nice plants out the front.

Yeah. So that people where they’re parking, things look a bit prettier. And, yeah, just did the, street up and, I don’t know if whether it had a direct influence on the community, but little things like that do make place feel better, feel more invested in feel more cared for.

And I remember that there was an occasion where. Some local teenagers had gotten into our laundromat. Do you remember this?

Lyndon: They got into it.

Breallyn: Yeah. Like when it was, I think it was late at night, like just before lockup or something.

Lyndon: Oh

Breallyn: And they’d made a big mess, including using one of the washing machines as a toilet.

Lyndon: What?

Breallyn: Yeah. So there was

Lyndon: how offensive

Breallyn: It was pretty bad. And they were actually some kids from a, like a community housing situation. So I got a phone call the next morning from, the man that was running the housing situation saying, some of our boys got in and they’ve made a mess.

We’ll, send them to clean and apologize to you. And I was like, yep, do you do that? And by the time I got there, Our worker that I’d employed to do the cleaning for us had already cleaned it all up.

Lyndon: Oh no.

Breallyn: yeah. So she had to deal with it all.

Lyndon: Oh my gosh. Yeah.

Breallyn: But that was before the transformation of the street.

I don’t know if there’s any correlation.

Lyndon: Oh, I don’t remember any of this stuff.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: But that’s strip of shops. it’s like a lot of these outlying suburbs have them where it’s just shops on one side of the street. There’s still houses on the other side, and Yeah.

They’re all joined up. it’s essentially one long building, isn’t it?

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: That’s why you’re saying it’s got it’s,

Breallyn: there’s two ends.

Lyndon: There’s two ends that are just exposed walls, and that’s where they’ve put the artwork.

all the shops in between. Basically, just,

Breallyn: yeah, there’s just They share a dividing wall between, us and the milk bar.

There was, yeah. Yeah. Just the one wall.

Lyndon: Yeah. Yeah. So they’re ugly. And over the years they just got more and more run down because they’re probably owned by one person who just wasn’t interested in putting any money into them.

Breallyn: Yeah. yeah, that was our experience. But, the other thing I was thinking about was the silo art that has really sprouted up a lot here in Victoria, but throughout Australia as well. There’s been a real movement of the huge old silos that, have. Traditionally been just big functional eyesore essentially taking that space and making it into an enormous rounded canvas.

The Silo Art Trail

There is exquisite work going on to transform them into these works of art, which is great. and the Australian Silo Art Trail stretches over 10,000 Ks and it begins in Northam, in Western Australia, and it ends in Three Moon in Queensland. you can drive from Western Australia across the East coast and up to Queensland and visit all these silos.

my brother and sister-in-law did it recently with some of their Victorian ones just went from one to another. It’s like just a little destination and all it does is. Draws you along, threading you through regional locations essentially with a little, not even little ’cause they’re huge, destination that is something to aim for.

But then of course you are able to experience all of the landscapes, all of the regional towns. It has a great affect on the local economies as well because you start spending money on accommodation or on, food and things from the shops and yeah, you get to see the towns at their best.

so yeah. Really has that flow on effect to communities and to an economy.

Lyndon: Our mate, Ricky. And, Matt Scullion are doing a tour

Breallyn: Oh, Where they, it’s called a Tag Along Tour.

So hang on. This is Ricky Wood that you’re talking about?

Lyndon: Yeah.

Breallyn: Who, co-host of our show the other week,

Lyndon: couple of months ago.

Breallyn: Yeah, a couple of months ago. Guest on our show.

Lyndon: Yeah. So a Tag Along Tour is basically when you grab your caravan and you go as a group or a posse and , follow a predetermined trail and you’re following the art, artists as in musicians, as they perform, in the different towns.

And I know Becky Cole, , used to do it. She probably still does. and there’s probably a bunch of people that do it. But yeah, this one actually is The Great Ocean Road Tag Along, and it’s, it’s 12 days of. Sing-alongs. So around the campfire shows sightseeing and, it is following the silo art and The Great Ocean Road.

So it starts, actually, I don’t know exactly where it starts, but somewhere in central Northern Central Victoria and then heads down towards, along the Great Ocean Road.

But it is, that’s where they’re, that’s what they’re doing. They’re following the, art

Breallyn: that’s really great. Like how they’re incorporating, music and live performance into

Yeah. making that another feature of

Lyndon: it’s a great idea. And the other thing is, we are camping, one of the good things about camping is meeting other people that are into the same stuff as you. you don’t have to talk to someone for long to realize that you, actually have.

A lot more in common than you might initially have thought.

Breallyn: yeah. That’s right.

Lyndon: just by the mere fact that you’re there in that place in a tent or a caravan or something. And and so if you go along on one of these tag along tours, you’re also there with people that are into the music.

it’s just narrowing it down even further.

Breallyn: And you’ve got that. exactly what community art is supposed to, is give you that commonality to start with.

Something to talk about, which then, helps you learn more about the people around you and Yeah.

It’s easier to embrace differences with other people once you’ve already established common ground.

Yeah.

Lyndon: So all you need now is for someone on this. Tour to be, murdered. And then you’ll have episode two.

Breallyn: Excellent.

Lyndon: you’ve got a merging, haven’t you, here of, the actual artwork on the silos and on the buildings.

And then you’ve got the musicians that are following that artwork.

Breallyn: Yeah. You’re

Lyndon: just missing the murder.

Breallyn: Missing out on the murder.

Murder, I should have called the episode Art and Murder Prevention.

Lyndon: you’re talking about crime before. yeah,

I think you’re right. That is a long bow, the murder thing.

Breallyn: It is,

I just wanted to shoehorn it in there somehow.

Lyndon: Do you reckon the silo art, which is found in these country areas, do you reckon that is an initiative of the artists themselves going, Hey, we wanna beautify the area.

And then it just so happens as an extra benefit that brings more peace to the community or something.

Breallyn: I don’t know if it’s just that the artists themselves have decided to do it. obviously they’ve got the vision for the piece and so on.

But I think it is part of a larger, town planning thing. And I think it does, it is like research backed to show that it does have such a good effect on the local economy. I guess the enhancement of the town, these. Silos. Sometimes you drive through a town and literally hovering over the top of the township, almost they were designed to be close to the areas of economics.

the, farmers would bring all their crops and so on to be stored in them. And so were like a necessary part of commerce and, , the local trading. But they’re literally sitting a lot of the time behind, literally behind the main strip of shops. So they’re quite dominating in the landscape.

But then once they’re are done, with these gorgeous paintings, it’s all of a sudden this huge, really standout piece sitting literally above the town. So they really do have that effect of glowing up the town essentially. Which makes it then, if. There’s some new, landscaping done in the park in the middle of town.

The whole thing comes together. so it’s, such a big impact visually on these spaces, which is amazing.

Research on Art and Crime Prevention

Lyndon: It is known that that open space gardens artwork and choirs funnily enough.

do a lot more than, you would at first think for a community

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: For the health of a community

Breallyn: for sure, and

Lyndon: for the happiness of a community.

normally when you see councils doing things like even what you were talking about, like beautifying that little strip of shops, making it more functional With the bins and making the whole street a bit more attractive. Yeah. Normally they, those things are done for economic reasons and to, ensure that land values and property prices go up and

Breallyn: Yeah, that’s right.

it’s part of the equation. I know in Frankston there was such a lot of crime in the local area there, near the station.

There is the shops. It’s just a hub of, traffic. There’s lots of snatch and grabs from handbags, shoplifting, that sort of thing. and also violent crime with fights and lots of, yeah. Of,

Lyndon: I don’t like this picture.

You are painting of my old hometown. It’s not my hometown, but,

Breallyn: it’s where you were living when we met.

Lyndon: and the woman that lived in the apartment opposite me. Above me. she did get taken away in a strait jacket.

Oh really? Wow. Yeah. I dunno what that was about. Good times.

Breallyn: Yeah. It’s definitely, always had the reputation of being a pretty rough area and a lot of crime.

But they started like playing really loudly from the speakers at

Lyndon: Oh, that’s right,

Breallyn: the station.

They started playing classical music.

And crime decreased. So they’d tried everything like, more police, more, cameras, this, that and the other. And that was the thing that had the biggest effect was yeah, just pumping out some classical music.

Lyndon: See that’s where I went wrong. When I worked at seven 11, I was playing Rage Against The Machine.

And a woman ran in, she ran in past the counter, out into the back room. She hid in the back storage room and wanted us to protect her from her boyfriend and said he had a gun. And I was

Breallyn: terrible

Lyndon: like.

Wait, what? So that sort of supports what you’re saying about,

Breallyn: did you call the police?

Lyndon: I can’t remember.

Breallyn: So you enraged him further by playing Rage Against The Machine?

Lyndon: I had to, when if you, when the boss, when I saw the boss arrive, I’d have to quickly turn off my cassette tape ’cause it was a little, ghetto blaster in the back room up on the highest shelf.

Sure. And that was hardwired into the speakers in the seven 11.

Breallyn: Oh my gosh.

Lyndon: And, it would normally just play radio and you know how radio cuts in and out and it’s, it was just really annoying. Playing. Yeah. I dunno. Fox fm or something. So I would just take in my cassette tapes and, at the time, yeah, I was listening to a lot of Rage Against The Machine, so that was, that.

Always got a run. But yeah, had to, had to turn it off when Pierre was arriving. He was such, he was a great guy, but yeah, he wouldn’t stand for that.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: Yeah.

Breallyn: there’s been a bunch of studies done in different cities and by different authorities in that to. Try to, quantify, this impact of art in space.

Lyndon: Art In space, in dogs, in space,

Breallyn: communal space,

Lyndon: Muppets in space,

Breallyn: Oh, hey, that would be interesting. We should do an episode on Art In Space as opposed to all the space junk that’s just floating around. Are you eating something?

Lyndon: I found some cashews in, my pocket.

Breallyn: Oh, yuck. Uck. No,

Lyndon: they’re warm.

I haven’t had lunch. They’re fresh. I put them in earlier before we started and I, had forgotten about them.

I’ll try and eat ’em quick.

Breallyn: The Australian Institute of Criminology has found that programs that help reduce vandalism often have a strong creative element associated with them. And also that they give participants a sense of ownership. Certainly when you are trying to prevent vandalism by getting, local artists involved in maintaining street scapes and, actually producing art on walls, they’re a lot less likely to be then vandalized by just random sort of graffiti.

So there’s a bunch of studies that. Really showing and discovering how art can have such an impact on local communities, , in terms of crime prevention and also just positive community attitudes that obviously then lead to a reduction in crime.

Art as Community Transformer

Lyndon: So you are saying then that art has a greater purpose than we might realize and it can actually prevent crime.

And if we can get our art outside into the extremities, then we can be superheroes.

Breallyn: If you, if that’s the conclusion you’ve drawn.

Lyndon: I’m still waiting for the murder

Breallyn: There’s no, there’s no murders coming. I told you it was a thin line. I was drawing there. No, I’m not really saying that at all.

what I’m saying is we know and artists know and people who appreciate art know how much of an impact it can have on your, your feelings, your day, the person that you are how it can reflect, thoughts, and emotions and, it can bring into being something that you felt but didn’t have a way of expressing.

So it’s, got all these powerful ways of describing our experience. So we know that. But to have that playing out in the day-to-day space, not when you’re going to a gallery , or you are, , going to see a play and you are there preparing yourself to be impacted, to be changed, to be challenged, anything like that.

Just in your day-to-day you’re going to get milk from the shop and having that experience be changed by art. I think that’s, quite incredible. And it is amazing that, yeah, just in general, people’s interactions and, community’s movements and the way that they see their communal spaces, that can be changed around almost 360 degree.

Oh no, actually you don’t want it. 360 180 degrees,

Lyndon: 360 would be pointless. you got dizzy for nothing

Breallyn: changed completely around, into a much more positive light just by giving an artist a commission to, to produce a piece in that space. I think that’s, yeah, really amazing.

Lyndon: The obvious one that we’ve overlooked is architecture.

Breallyn: Yeah. That I know that I haven’t, focused on that at all. I just was because it was too big,

Lyndon: literally. Because architecture Can have that same effect.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: I guess there is a lot of artworks and sculptures and things out in the public, and even if it’s just a new take, a new design on something practical, like

Breallyn: like bike racks or something.

Lyndon: Yeah.

Or even something as simple as instead of having to look at disgusting bins, there’s a nice thing that surrounds them or that hides them or whatever.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: so we are, there is that stuff where we are moving through a space and we might actually be quite unaware of these things that are actually helping us or enabling us to feel a certain way.

architecture also does that without us realizing and sometimes. There are things that we for sure we realize like people get so upset with those, what do they call them? The butter sticks on? The

Breallyn: cheese sticks.

Lyndon: The cheese sticks on, yeah.

Breallyn: On the freeway.

Lyndon: On the freeway at City Link, what are they for? Why are they there? And these big yellow leaning pylons or whatever you wanna call them

Breallyn: now, they’re anxiety inducing, aren’t They, they look like they’re just hanging there waiting to drop on the freeway.

Lyndon: They don’t bother me at all. a skyscraper or something will also have an effect,

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: And sometimes you notice the ones that are done with Real clever design or something to make them stand out. We’ve got a building in the city that has, I don’t know, is it real gold in it?

Breallyn: the top five stories or something, are, plated in gold.

Lyndon: Yeah. And it stands out for obvious reasons when you’re in the city. And, , this is the same building as has got the bees crawling up. there’s these big, sculptures, of bees at the bottom.

Breallyn: Is it?

Lyndon: Yeah, I think so.

Breallyn: I thought it was the Eureka Tower.

Lyndon: I think that is the one.

Breallyn: Oh, I can’t remember the bottom of it.

but when you are heading towards the city from the northern suburbs. Yeah. The sun shines off.

Breallyn: Yeah. Off

Lyndon: the top of that building.

Breallyn: It really catches the eye, doesn’t it?

Lyndon: It’s quite glorious.

Breallyn: Yeah.

Lyndon: Yeah, so architecture is another thing that, that does that.

Breallyn: Yeah, I like the way that architecture

Lyndon: or doesn’t do it.

Breallyn: does that from, before it’s even created something, the ideas of like how urban planning and that works, like how people are gonna move through this space. What can we do to create a certain, traffic flow or a certain type of interaction between people?

How can this building serve the people? yeah, it’s doing, it’s doing all of that, but Yeah, very intentionally and right from the start. Whereas I suppose what I’ve been touching on today is more like when there’s an established community and there’s, certain patterns of behavior going on, how installing some visual artwork

Lyndon: or playing classical music or playing

Breallyn: classical music.

Lyndon: I forgot about that.

Breallyn: Can change that. Yeah, very cool.

Lyndon: Very interesting.

Breallyn: Thanks for listening today catch you next time.

Lyndon: Bye.

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