Waihi showgrounds sheds to get clean-up

Waihi College students and Waihi Beach artist Shane Walker working together to create this mural at the A&P Showgrounds.

Two community groups and talented Waihi College students have come together to give the A&P sheds by State Highway 2 a spruce up.

The buildings have been covered in graffiti for several years now and Keep Waihi Beautiful approached the A&P committee with a proposal to give them a tidy up.

"Keep New Zealand Beautiful is not just about picking up rubbish and changing habits around litter," says Acting Chairperson Jonnette Mead.

"The national organisation also has a comprehensive graffiti programme, and the team thought the sheds would be an ideal candidate for our first graffiti clean-up and mural project here in Waihi."

Local artist Shane Walker (left), students from Waihi College, A&P committee member Jeannine Wiki with Anne Marie Spicer and Justin Hawkes (in high vis jackets)from Keep Waihi Beautiful.

The A&P committee was happy to come on board and donated $1500 to the project.
KWB also received a grant from Creative New Zealand and has hired local artist Shane Walker to oversee the project.

"It's great to have Shane working with us," says A&P committee member Jeannine Wiki. "Shane has already done a lot of work here in Waihi and will be working with our college students to create designs for murals for the sheds, which they'll paint themselves. We can't wait to see what they come up with."

The two Year 12 and three Year 13 students, supervised by Shane, will each get NCEA credits for the work they're putting into the project.

The project has also received some generous backing — graffiti kits have been donated by KNZB, and Resene has donated all the paint.

"We're very lucky," says KWB member and Project Manager, Anne Marie Spicer.

"We applied for free basecoat from Resene as part of Keep New Zealand's anti-graffiti campaign. When they heard that this community project involved several groups as well as students, they offered to provide all our paint and graffiti guard for free for all three sheds, which was very generous."

Shane and the students have begun work on the murals, which will have an agricultural theme and will be finished by the end of this term.