The Celebration Dreaming

Yarra City Council received a grant through the Department of Justice and Regulation’s Graffiti Prevention Grants program to commission a Victorian Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander artist to create a meaningful artwork in Fitzroy. The artworks aim was to focus on Aboriginal identity and culture in Fitzroy and highlight the history and significance of Gertrude Street, the building and the area for the Aboriginal community. Painting was completed by Robert Young alongside Heesco and Mike Makatron.

The mural references the cultural connections Fitzroy has to Australia's first peoples. Intertwined with images of urban life are depictions of Aboriginal stories like Bunjil the eagle, the creator to the Kulin nation.

The waterfall symbolises the well of knowledge and acknowledges the past, while the two-storey tree represents the future and interconnectedness.

But one of the most eye-catching features of the mural are the portraits of Aboriginal people, left deliberately indistinct so young Aboriginal people could imagine their own family members in them.