Keep Australia Colourful

For some people graffiti is a culture on its own. For others it’s nothing but paint on a wall that no matter how good it looks, it shouldn’t be there. The debate about it is endless and I’m pretty sure you have all witnessed at least one person in your life bashing on a real nice piece of graffiti cause they simply don’t get it. Some people in Australia though decided to take this a bit too far. Around May of 2010 the New South Wales state government came up with the concept of “Graffiti Action Day”, as an effort to reduce vandalism associated with graffiti across the state. In order to combat such activities they decided to paint over as many surfaces covered with graffiti as possible. Apparently it wasn’t too easy for them to handle so local businessmen and students were asked to help them out, but a team of artists and pro-graffiti individuals decided to go against their plan with a motto of their own. The government’s “Keep Australia Beautiful” was switched to “Keep Australia Colourful” in a campaign developed by people who want to put a message across that graffiti itself is a form of art, in response to the state government's intention to remove it from city streets and public spaces and marginalize it as a part of a delinquent subculture. The people behind the “Keep Australia Colourful” campaign who’s main goal is to raise the awareness of locals on how the city would look if there was more space for artists to paint legally, also run a website called keepaustraliacolourful.org posting all sorts of events, programs as well as a section with various pictures of pieces located in the streets all across the country