Tribute to John Noakes to Launch Paint NZ Beautiful 2012

On Sunday 15 April at 3:45pm, Keep Dunedin Beautiful will officially open the newly painted Company Bay bus shelter to celebrate John Noakes’ work and to launch Paint NZ Beautiful (PNZB) 2012.

As part of Keep Dunedin Beautiful’s shelter beautification project, local artist Daniel Mead has been commissioned to paint John’s portrait (and examples from his work elsewhere) on the Company Bay bus shelter as a tribute to the work he began so many years before.

John Noakes lived in Broad Bay, Dunedin.  On returning home one dark night he saw children huddled in a graffiti-covered bus shelter at Company Bay.  He wanted to do something to brighten it up for them and so his plan to paint murals on bus shelters was formed.

Over the next decade or so, he painted 65 bus shelters with various local scenes and wacky creatures. These bus shelters have delighted old and young alike but over the past few years lack of maintenance has seen many deteriorate. John’s widow Jennepher believes that John would be looking down and gates giving us the thumbs up for the continuation and care of his work.

Keep Dunedin Beautiful successfully submitted to the Dunedin City Council in the 2011 annual plan process for funding to maintain and/or repair/repaint these bus shelter murals.  To date, 20 shelters have been touched up, redone or completely repainted.

The Dunedin event is the showcase for PNZB Mural campaign, with previous years launched in Tokoroa and Hastings. More information about the campaign is available at www.knzb.org.nz

A positive and vibrant project supported by Resene Paints and the Ministry of Justice, PNZB is a nationwide promotion and celebration of how Keep New Zealand Beautiful and its subsidiary branches, including Keep Dunedin Beautiful, are working with communities to become, and remain, free of graffiti vandalism, as well as beautification, civic pride and litter abatement projects.