Melbourne Graffiti History at Gasworks

I teamed up a little while ago with another local who’s heavily into the graffiti scene.  I’ve posted lots of videos in the past showing the graffiti around Melbourne but I don’t really know any detail about the scene.  The guy you’ll see in this video goes by the name DurtCityDestroyers on YouTube and he’s running a gallery show at a gallery called Gasworks (ut’s housed in an old gasworks building) that details the history of the Melbourne graffiti scene.

I’ll warn you up front, this guy doesn’t stop moving – he’s stuck on permanent fast forward!

Oh, and I have no idea what the story is with the bloke in the helmet.  Durt said he would explain it to me but I haven’t heard from him recently.  For anyone in Melbourne looking for something to do, the gallery launch is this Tuesday:

“Grassroots – an urban arts experience”
Gasworks Foyer Gallery
9th Sept – 20th Sept 2008
Launch on Tuesday 9th September 7pm – 9pm

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Bullshit graffiti laws

Good news!  All the murderers, rapists, drug dealers, bank robbers and terrorist in Australia have been caught.  Bad news!  Now the cops have to go after someone else to justify their existence.

Or at least that where I think the insane new anti-graffiti laws in Melbourne came from.  Follow this link for the horrifying details but here’s the summary:

• $550 fine just for carrying a spray can
• $26,000 fine if convicted of graffiti vandalism
• 2 year jail term if convicted of graffiti vandalism

This is plain fucking stupid.  The idea of criminalising non-violent offenders for the sake of appealing to conservative voters by appearing “tough on crime” is absolutely cretinous.  Even if you think graffiti is vandalism and a crime rather than art, the severity of these penalties is way out of scale with the offence.

Last weekend we had a bit of a mini-gathering of YouTube users in Melbourne’s Federation Square.  While hanging out we shot a few round table vox pops on a range of topics, including these new graffiti laws.  Some young lads who have a YouTube channel call TwoGuysOneChannel had a particularly good rant on the topic.

Coincidentally we were just across the road from one of Melbourne’s best graffiti lanes so I thought I’d show off just how heinous these crimes are.

Walking tours of Melbourne

One of the things we want to do with the upcoming As One gathering in Melbourne is make it something more than standing around and saying hello. From all accounts (from those who have attended other gatherings) this is actually a fun thing to do and if that’s all we manage to get happening in Sydney then it will be a success.

But for Melbourne we’re planning to “take it to the next level” as they say. I’m not sure exactly who “they” are in this context but I’m sure somebody says that. To that end, we’re in the midst of planning a range of activities for the day.

When considering the nature of the likely attendees (people with video cameras) and the fact many of them may not know Melbourne very well we decided showing off some of the more hidden, yet visually interesting, parts of Melbourne would be a good idea. So we will be offering some walking tours to show off some Melbourne secrets.

Fortunately, as this video shows, there are many interesting things only a short walk from our gathering point.