Art in everyday spaces

Late last year, while preparing another project, I had the privilege of meeting some Newtown-based street artists and art enthusiasts. Most of these people aren't too forthcoming with their 'real' identities - like many inhabitants of the online space, they revel in anonymity. Their cultural product is more important anyway, and there's always a concern for the legal issues around street art. But turn one or two corners in the Newtown area, and this art is everywhere...

'I have a dream' mural, King St (Photos: Chris Martin)

TV in front of a stencil wall, Marrickville

"It's like a jungle sometimes," Enmore Rd

Some of these works are commissioned and legal, most are not. In an interview, one habitual Newtown street artist and graffiti tagger, Vars, told me the motivations behind his work are simple - that the walls are there, they look pretty boring when they're blank, and nobody gets hurt by a bit of paint.

The Newtown streets have plenty in common with the cultural environment of the online media. There's an infinite canvas of Internet wallspace to be decorated, and you have to go well out of your way if you want be a vandal.

Such is the concept behind our project. Canvas Collective (still a working title) will be the streets and alleyways of the online art community. With the advantages of the online format, we can create an easily accessible hub for artists and art fans to share their works and engage with others'. It's a leisurely walk around the back alleys of Newtown with a detour through the most prestigious national galleries, meeting the like-minded along the way.

And incidentally, even the community of artists painting Sydney streetscapes doesn't always wallow in lonesome anonymity. Just recently, the artist Heesco won the third series of Secret Wars, a live 'paint-off' competition involving some of the city's most talented street artists, and held in the suitably underground confines of the Oxford Art Factory.

It's exactly the kind of artistic community spirit for which Canvas Collective can provide a permanent home.