“Words cannot describe how proud and excited we are to win gold for the best Australian Street Art Trail,” Murray Ross, on behalf of the Tongala Lions Club Street Art Project, said.
“Our volunteer artists have worked so hard over the past few years to give visitors a reason to come to Tongala and this is the icing on the cake.
“We’re expecting a positive result for our local economy with now even more reasons to come and visit our little mural town.”
Tongala boasts more than 50 volunteer-produced works which showcase stories of the town’s early settlers, their meeting places, as well as the joys and tribulations they experienced.
Additional pieces shed light on Tongala in the modern era as industry, such as the Nestlé factory, shaped the town and its community.
In commenting on Tongala Street Art Trail’s win, the judges congratulated Tongala for taking onboard their feedback from last year and then digging deep to improve the town’s art tourism offering.
“Tongala’s win proves that even small communities can gain an excellent understanding of their visitor market and work cleverly to attract those people, and it is inspiring to hear how murals painted by locals have been used to breathe life back into this town,” the judges said.
Tongala nudged out the Maryborough Mural Project on Queensland’s Fraser Coast, which won the Silver Award, and a trail of quirky artworks in Kalgoorlie-Boulder called Little Finds, which snagged the Bronze Award.
The Australian Street Art Awards, a tourism awards for public art program, encourage Australians to explore the world-class street and public art that is freely accessible all-year-round and found in every corner of the country.
