Sir, Step Away From the Graffiti

David Weigel | April 18, 2007

An Canadian Australian law-and-order stunt gone awry:

The ACT's Chief Minister Jon Stanhope has asked the police to investigate if Liberal MLA Steve Pratt has broken the law by painting over a graffiti mural while proving a point about vandalism.

On the weekend, Mr Pratt invited the media to watch him clean the mural at Woden which is believed to be a legal artwork commissioned by a local sporting club.

Mr Pratt says Mr Stanhope is wrong and that the area isn't zoned for public art.

"Even if it was legally commissioned artwork, it should not have been painted in an area that is not a designated art mural area," he said.

"And secondly it is totally inappropriate for it to be placed on the entrance way to a cemetery which is a sacred and a serene place."

Charles Paul Freund profiled the kind of artist that would give Pratt nightmares back in 2004.

Comments

|4.18.07 @ 9:08AM|#

Mr Pratt says Mr Stanhope is wrong and that the area isn't zoned for public art.

Not zoned for art?! Fricken Canada. What a bunch of hozers.

The Hanson Brothers|4.18.07 @ 9:42AM|#

Hey. Stanhope took my quarter.

|4.18.07 @ 9:52AM|#

A slight correction. That story is from Australia. ACT is the Australian Capital Territory.

|4.18.07 @ 10:00AM|#

Jason beat me to it.

If you want to irritate a Canadian you call him a American.

But if you call an Australian a Canadian...well I don't want to be around to see the consequences.

|4.18.07 @ 10:05AM|#

Gee, it's going to be so easy to take their oil when the time comes.

|4.18.07 @ 10:09AM|#

Australia has oil?

The Steve Irwin Five|4.18.07 @ 10:20AM|#

Croikey! The Dingo ate my baby!

Rhywun|4.18.07 @ 11:04AM|#

That story is from Australia.

Yeah, I was about to ask what the heck is an "MLA". Same as "MP"?

So... the local sporting club owns the entrance to a cemetery? Um, OK.

Anyway, I despise graffiti of the "pissing to mark territory" sort - which is about 95% of it where I live. But usually it's obvious which is pissing and which is meant to convey some other content. Maybe ordinary graffiti is more artistic in Australia...

|4.18.07 @ 11:38AM|#

That story is from Australia.

Oh well, that's different... Wait a minute, it's not different at all. Fricken Australia. What a bunch of drongos.

|4.18.07 @ 12:18PM|#

So... the local sporting club owns the entrance to a cemetery? Um, OK.

I'm fairly sure that cemeteries in Australia are either state or city owned. It's not the kind of thing that was ever private there.

Thus the governing authority could permit the painting of a mural there.

Did anyone else check out what the "sporting club" was? I had to google Disk Golf to find out what it was. :)

Sonfuced Mooce|4.18.07 @ 12:39PM|#

mein Gott - I thought the "S" was a "C".

mercy. That changed things a bit

|4.18.07 @ 2:02PM|#

Moose, what did you find when you googled that?

:)

VM|4.18.07 @ 2:10PM|#

oooh. you don't want to see that.

Think: Token's reaction in the Lord of the Rings episode!

|4.18.07 @ 2:41PM|#

Who owns the building?

Ah, that's right, the government owns everything.. and as a Liberal MLA, of course that douche owns it by extension..

|4.18.07 @ 4:36PM|#

Think: Token's reaction in the Lord of the Rings episode!

"I don't know. I don't want to know. I'm out"
heh heh heh that was hellafunny