Lord Mayor Robert Doyle slams street art precinct Hosier Lane for losing its way

ONE of the city’s famous street art precincts has lost its way and top graffiti artists are moving to other locations, Melbourne’s Lord Mayor believes.

Hosier fail

ONE of the city’s famous street art precincts has lost its way and top graffiti artists are moving to other locations.

Lord Mayor Robert Doyle said globally recognised Hosier Lane was suffering from poor-quality art.

“The artwork is substandard, they’ve painted over some of the most iconic artwork and what they’ve put in its place is nowhere near as good as what was there,” he said.

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Cr Doyle said that a piece of Hindu-themed graffiti that British comedian Russell Brand had approvingly tweeted about was gone.

“Once it was, you didn’t do work in Hosier Lane unless you were a top crew, and if you were painting something over you made sure it was better than what was there before,” he said.

“Hosier Lane has always been our premier street art lane, and I’m a bit worried that except for big commissioned pieces, I’m worried that the street art is actually moving out of the centre of the city and into the ’burbs,” Cr Doyle said.

Robert Doyle says bad graffiti has replaced good street art in Hosier Lane. Picture: Josie Hayden

Adrian Doyle at a lane in Franklin St. Picture: Josie Hayden

Noted street artist Adrian Doyle confirmed that some of the top artists had moved on from the city.

“It’s fallen out of the hands of artists, it’s back in the bureaucracy and people who aren’t artists are in charge of it,” he said.

“So basically, all us artists have set up new laneways ... that are even better than Hosier.”

Mr Doyle said that local community group Hosier Inc had tried to curate the lane with good intentions.

“But it “should have let the artists deal with it,” Mr Doyle said.

However, Melanie Raymond, from Hosier Inc affiliated group Youth Projects, said that while there were some commissioned pieces in the lane, it was still full of spontaneity.

“Given the amount of activity on all the walls of our building every day and every night, we don’t get involved, we’re just surprised every day,” she said.

“The tourists love it, and who is able to judge what is good and what is bad art.”

European tourists Zsuzsanna, 23, and Stephanie, 20, were impressed with the scale and quality of works in Hosier Lane and nearby Rutledge Lane.

“All of our friends who have come to Melbourne have taken pictures here, it was in the top five things that we wanted to visit,” said Zsuzsanna.

“It’s in the small streets and kind of hidden — if it would be all over the city it would be a different story.”

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