The Cromwell Community Board gave the Cromwell Youth Art Project, an extension of the Alexandra Youth Art Project, the green light earlier this week. It will be run by the Central Otago District Council and Central Otago District Arts Trust.
Last year, local artist Maxine Williams worked with students from Alexandra, Terrace, St Gerard’s and Clyde primary schools to design and paint murals representing the Alexandra-Clyde basin.
Four murals were painted on public toilet facades — three in Alexandra, at the BMX park, Ventry St and Molyneux Park, and one in Clyde, at the railway station.
Due to the project’s success, the council and trust wanted to extend the programme to Cromwell and eventually the Teviot Valley.
As done in Alexandra and Clyde, Ms Williams would run workshops with a small group of creative pupils from each of the three primary schools in the Cromwell ward — Cromwell, Goldfields and Tarras — to teach them art techniques in term 3.
Ms Williams said the children would do most of the work but hoped the public could contribute at Bannockburn’s Across the Bridge event in late September, as had happened with mural work during the Alexandra Thyme Festival last year.
Ms Williams said the murals not only made towns more vibrant, it gave children career options.
"It just makes the town more colourful and a better place to be and it brings parents and kids closer together.
"Kids can realise if they want to be a street artist ... just like a scientist it’s actually a vocation."
A report to the board by council property and facilities officer Christina Martin said the murals were likely to be installed at the Alpha St toilets, Cromwell Swim Centre and either the Bendigo or Champagne Gully toilets by November.
The project was expected to cost $12,141.
The Cromwell Community Board approved $5000 of funding at its meeting on Tuesday from the board’s reserves contribution account.
The Central Otago District Arts Trust planned to make applications to several trusts and charities to fund the rest of the project.
Ms Williams also led the creation of a community mural at the Ranfurly swimming pool last year.
