Mural complete on historic Mt Barker building ahead of Mountains and Murals festival

The finishing touches have been applied to a mural adorning the Mt Barker Old Police Station and Folk Museum after a workshop where David Johnson taught eight visiting artists how to paint like Walldogs.

The workshop, which ran as part of the 2022 Southern Art and Craft Trail, went ahead despite difficult weather conditions on the first weekend of October.

Johnson — Mt Barker’s resident member of the Walldogs mural group and organiser of the town’s Mountains and Murals festival — said at the time it had perhaps been a “bit ambitious” to think they could compete the mural in one day.

A couple of wet weeks later, the mission to brighten up the historic Mt Barker building is complete.

“It’s come up a treat and hopefully will attract visitors to our unique museum,” he said.

The workshop was also an opportunity to teach signwriting techniques to some of the artists who will return to help visiting Walldogs during the Mountain and Murals festival from November 16-20.

Seventeen artists from Canada, the US, the UK and Australia will travel to Mt Barker next month for a busy five days of painting and community events. It will be the second edition of Mountains and Murals after the inaugural festival in 2019.

The design of the eight new murals, including a new entry statement for Mt Barker, will be revealed ahead of the festival.