Glenvill are very excited to announce the opening of internationally renowned street artist Rone’s latest project at YarraBend.
Over a series of weeks, Melbourne based street artist Rone has transformed the interior of an early 1900s weatherboard house on the YarraBend site into what he describes as a “fantasy film set”. The first of its kind for the artist, the house is part art exhibition, part installation, containing a series of Rone’s signature ‘Jane Doe’ portraits on each of the home’s walls – the striking beauty and intimacy of which provide an uneasy energy amid the brokenness and decay of the abandoned house. Heightening the eerie, cinematic feel of the space, he also teamed up with interior stylist, Carly Spooner to recreate the archetypal mid-century Australian interior landscape.
The Omega Project, which resides at 28 Parkview Rd on the eastern boundary of the YarraBend site, sits all by itself with its neighbouring homes long since bulldozed. From the mid-1950’s to the mid-1980’s the Australian Paper Mills bought and demolished all of the other houses on Parkview Rd to accommodate an expansion that never came. The Dunstone’s, who resided at 28 Parkview Rd, would not sell, and remained living there in isolation for the next three decades. When Glenvill acquired the site in 2013 the family finally offered up the house for sale, but Glenvill CEO Len Warson would not buy it. 89 year old Joe Dunstone operated his plaster business from its back yard, and Len was not prepared to take away an old man’s livelihood. It was only several years later, when Joe was no longer able to work, that Glenvill finally purchased the property.
With vision to create an innovative new suburb founded on six pillars, one being art and design, it is a priority of Glenvill’s to incorporate art into every phase of the development. Rone was engaged almost immediately, a perfect fit for the dilapidated buildings whose permanence were fleeting. The Omega Project, which Rone describes as a nostalgic representation of the iconic Australian home, will soon be replaced by the new iconic Australian home. It is this continuation of the narrative which almost makes the work more powerful, paying homage to what was before making way for what’s to come.
The beauty of street art is in its impermanence. It almost makes the viewer appreciate it more, knowing that it is there one day and could be gone the next. The Omega Project opens July 22nd, and is set for demolition immediately after at the end of July.