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Produced and published by the School of Historical & Philosophical Studies, The University of Melbourne
Published July 2008
Published July 2008
Partners
Since World War I Melbourne has become the home of many significant public murals. Commissioned by both public and private patrons, these murals reflect the changing taste and values of the people of Melbourne.
The first major public mural was commissioned by the Felton Bequest in 1921 for the entrance foyer to the Public (State) Library and Art Gallery in Swanston Street. Harold Septimus Power, an official war artist on the Western Front, was chosen to depict the spirit of the soldiers on the East and Western fronts, to commemorate Australian involvement in World War I. A companion mural, 'Peace after Victory', was commissioned in 1929. Mervyn Napier Waller was the artist chosen to complete this mural, which depicts an idyll of classical figures in triumphal procession. Napier Waller had recently completed mural commissions for the newly restored Melbourne Town Hall (1926) and the T & G Life Assurance Building (1928).
Napier Waller dominated the public art scene in Melbourne until 1950, producing murals, stained glass and mosaics. He taught at the Working Men's College from 1932 where he offered a course in mural painting. After 1950 Len Annois, Leonard French, Karl Duldig, Mirka Mora and Sidney Nolan all completed public murals which were very different in style and subject matter from those of Napier Waller. These included the 'Symmetry of sport' at the Beaurepaire Centre, University of Melbourne in 1956 by Leonard French; the Pharmacy College mural, by Len Annois, in 1960; 'The progress of man' in St Kilda Road in 1960 by Karl Duldig; Mirka Mora's murals for Café Balzac and Tolarno Restaurant.
In 1973 Harold Freedman was appointed State Artist by the Premier's Department. Freedman was a colleague of Napier Waller's from the Working Men's College and they had worked together on the monumental mosaic for the Australian War Memorial in Canberra. Freedman directed a studio that completed two large murals in Melbourne. The first, painted between 1973 and 1977, was titled 'One hundred years of transport 1835-1935' and was installed in the main hall at Spencer Street Station. The other mural was a mosaic for the Eastern Hill Fire Station titled 'The legend of fire' (1980-82).
From the late 1970s a group of artists including Geoff Hogg began to paint more socially relevant murals in Melbourne. One of the first of these was the 'Builders' Workers' Mural' (1977-78) in Cato Street, Hawthorn. In 1984 Hogg was commissioned to paint a mural for Melbourne's new underground railway, at Museum Station and in 1985, Gwenda Wiseman painted 'From the Hod to the Favco' with support from the Builders' Labourers Federation and additional State and federal funding. The position of State Artist was not renewed after 1983, and a distinct shift in the funding priorities of both State and federal governments favoured collaborative projects with very specific constituencies. The murals that were produced during the 1980s reflect this shift in emphasis and the changing social values of Melbourne's public art. A 1984 mural by New York artist Keith Haring, on a wall at the Collingwood Technical College, has been placed on the Victorian Heritage Register.