By Andr? Hueber
A colourful mural on the side of Tamaterau bus shelter has been tarred by taggers only two weeks after it was painted.
Tamaterau resident Tim said members of the community recently contacted Shirley, a Whangarei artist, to beautify their drab-looking bus shelter.
Shirley maintains painted bus shelters in Onerahi and
other murals before Whangarei bridge. Tim and Shirley have requested we don't use their surnames as they fear potential retribution. Tim said he felt outraged and disappointed when he saw the tagging last week.
"It's a pity that Shirley's mural has been struck so soon ... she hasn't even finished it yet." Shirley has been painting bus shelters for the last five years.
She started simply painting out graffiti, but her late South African friend Jenny taught her how to create the colourful murals.
"When I first showed her the bus shelters, she cringed, but we got to work and that's how it began."
Whangarei District Council pays for the background paint and Shirley gets small pots of colour from Resene at a discount.
She had planned to draw a funky-looking rabbit on the side but now doesn't think she'll bother. "A more simplified version will do. The murals used to put people off tagging, but now it's open slather." She said more public days needed to be held to remove graffiti.
"The [Northern Advocate organised] paint out in Raumanga last year was a huge success. We need more days like that. We don't need lots of publicity. Just an ad in the paper saying `show up at 9am with a paint brush ... lets get cracking'." Shirley said she thought schools could do more to help with the creation of art work and murals in bus shelters outside their own patches.
Onerahi Community Constable Daryl Curan said this is the first graffiti attack at Whangarei Heads in six months, and buildings all the way to Ocean beach have been affected. He said tagging with words such as "bloods" suggest it's gang related.
