Look up and a couple parachuting rats are descending on Presgrave Place in Melbourne. Three-dimensional version of Banksy’s stencil but it is not the work of the famous British street artist but a prolific Melbourne street artist known as Kranky who makes art from plastic rats and dolls.
Look down and the dolls arms poking out from the grating, that remind me of the children currently held in indefinite detention of the Australian government, is also the work of Kranky. (Wait a minute one of those hands has a cigarette butt.)
Look at the wall and there is more work by Kranky and other street artists.
There has been street art in Presgrave Place for quiet some time; if my memory still serves me there were frames on its wall when it was shown in Marcus Westbury’s 2007 series Not Quite Art. However, there never was that much art in Presgrave Place. Just that one wall really, around the corner there is the dead end and the rubbish bins and back doors of businesses. Without the graffiti writers it never had the same turn over of work. The frames, some stickers, a paste-up by Happy and the couple of Junky Projects sat on its walls for years.
The paste-up by Happy and the Junky Projects are still there but they have a lot more company, it is now intense. Last year Kranky started to crank out assemblages in the place, along with everywhere in Melbourne, but this new energy was what was needed to revitalise the place. Kranky was followed by Mikonik who continued the tradition of using cheap picture frames sourced in opportunity shops. Sunfigo and Luv[sic] followed with this theme framing their work; Luv[sic] regularly uses frames but this is new for Sunfigo. Tinky added toy soldiers attacking the Mona Lisa and other pieces using plastic figures. The frames themselves refer to art.
Distinguishing between street art and graffiti is not always easy but in Presgrave Place the distinction is clear. Street art is made of wide variety of media, not just aerosol paint. It is generally denser, there is a greater quantity of both art and artists. The artists have made more use of specific aspects of the site, the wall is often not just a support for the art work but part of it. The subject matter is different too; street art refers to art and popular culture. The calligraphy and letter form of graffiti are not important.
Presgrave Place is a quiet place in the middle of Melbourne that is currently having its own little street art Renaissance.
Black Mark 
September 7th, 2022 at 2:03 PM
[…] art and energy revived the location in 2016. (See my post Presgrave Place Renaissance.) Now, the continued presence of work by the Ninja of Street Art and many other artists keeps […]