The Accor hotel group announced in a press release this month that its new Art Series hotel in Perth will be named after one of Australian street art’s most influential large-scale muralists – Matt Adnate.
Adnate, who has already begun work due to be completed in October, was engaged by Accor to paint a 27-storey mural, as well as a 50m plus laneway mural, while the interior walls of the hotel will be decorated with the artist’s collection of work – hence the hotel has in fact been named ‘The Adnate’, after the artist.
What is being called a mega mural, when finished the artwork will exceed Adnate’s personal record he set when he painted a 20-storey artwork on the Collingwood housing tower, nearby where he grew up.
However, the new record does not eclipse the significance of Adnate’s past works, as reported in reported in W.A. Today, the mural would feature three different faces including the face of a Nyoongar man. This represents a personal connection Adnate feels towards First Nation people and sharing their cultural heritage has become an epicentre of importance in his work.
ANZ Street Portraits – Jenny Munro 60 from Josh van Cuylenburg on Vimeo.
This best exemplified in a short film featuring Adnate and shot by Josh van Cuylenburg, as part of a project in Sydney that celebrated inspiring locals. In reference to his 2016 mural of Aboriginal elder Jenny Munro painted in the Sydney CBD, Adnate said in the short film, “For me, growing up as a kid, I didn’t learn anything about Indigenous Australians. The journey that I have been on since I started painting them is completely life changing. I have a portrait of Jenny Munro in the city. It’s going to further the awareness of Aboriginal culture today. It’s in an environment that was taken from them, it’s them reclaiming the space.”