Karingal Hub Arts Trail (2022), Frankston, Victoria. Mural Artwork by Claire Foxton, Photography by Trystin Sinnott. Curated and produced by ART AID for IFM Investors.
An arts trail woven through a centre at the gateway to the Mornington Peninsula.
ART AID curated and produced a multi-disciplinary arts trail integrated throughout Karingal Hub in Frankston for IFM Investors: murals, sculptural installations, furniture, and more, carrying through each connecting space of the centre and giving customers a reason to dwell and discover.
Karingal Hub Arts Trail, Frankston. Mural Artwork by Abbey Rich, Photography by Trystin Sinnott.
The project
Karingal translates to Happy Home in Koori language, and that idea underpins the trail: a place for play and connection. Frankston sits at the gateway to the Mornington Peninsula, its community of farmers, families, outdoor enthusiasts, and creatives shaped by the bushland, wineries, parklands, and coastline of Port Phillip Bay that surround it. Working with seven artists across murals, sculpture, and furniture, the trail brings land and sea together inside the centre, in a mixture of bright and subdued hues that connect one space to the next.
The trail carries through each connecting space of the centre. Mural Artwork by Kyle Hughes-Odgers, Photography by Trystin Sinnott.
The artists
The trail features works by Abbey Rich, Benja Harney, Claire Foxton, Kyle Hughes-Odgers, Lauren Carney, Studio Dennis, and Tristan Kerr.
Benja Harney (Paperform) is a paper engineer, recognised as a pioneer in his field in Australia and internationally. His sculptural ceiling installation for Karingal Hub features local foliage and floral iconography fabricated from recycled materials sourced from the community, adding value to unwanted and forgotten items and layering a story of place into the work itself.
Tristan Kerr is an artist and typographer whose work combines fragments of street signage, mark making, graffiti, and abstraction, asking people to stop, look, and question what public space might constitute. His text based mural at Karingal Hub leads shoppers towards the Town Square.
Work in progress across the trail. Photography by Trystin Sinnott.
Studio Dennis (Andrew Dennis) draws on 20th century art, comics, and skateboard culture to create decorative, wallpaper-like murals dealing in civilisation, future living, and animal behaviour. Responding to the site, his mural for Karingal Hub is organic, fluid, and floral.
Claire Foxton is known for a large body of public art across Australia, New Zealand, and the United States, mixing abstract and realistic techniques to explore site specific narratives about the connectedness of people and place. For Karingal Hub, she integrated locally found species of flora and fauna into her murals, drawing the viewer into a conversation about land, story, and identity.
Kyle Hughes-Odgers is a multi-disciplinary visual artist recognised in Australia and internationally, with large-scale public works spanning New York, Washington DC, London, Singapore, Berlin, and cities across Australia. His three-level abstract mural for Karingal Hub wraps the lift shaft at the centre of the precinct, carrying his signature geometric forms, colour, and movement across every floor, and transforming a purely functional structure into a landmark at the heart of the place.
The trail spans murals, sculpture, and furniture. WIP by Benja Harney, Photography by Trystin Sinnott.
Karingal Hub Arts Trail. Mural Artwork by Tristan Kerr, Photography by Trystin Sinnott.
With thanks to the seven artists whose works carry the trail through the centre. To Trystin Sinnott for the photography. And to ISPT for a commission that treats a shopping centre as a place for art to live.
ART AID is a public art and cultural consultancy working at the intersection of art, community, and place. To find out more about our work visit art-aid.co or follow @artaidau.
