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https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2025/oct/20/peter-drew-aussie-posters-adelaide-anti-immigration-march>
"Peter Drew works swiftly, transforming a blank city wall into a work of art
designed to spark questions about what it means to be Australian.
The efficient movements of the Adelaide artist should come as no surprise – he
has plastered as many as 5,000 of his striking “Aussie” posters on city walls
around the country – and he’s about do more.
As he brushes starchy glue on the wall to hold up the colourised archival
images on Sunday, people glance and occasionally pause, curious.
A man in a One Nation T-shirt wanders up with a friendly smile – he needs
directions to the nearby anti-immigration protest.
At the last protest, an exercise in jingoism based on the fear of so-called
“mass migration”, protesters tore Drew’s posters down as he was putting them
up.
That inspired him to reinvigorate the project, with 1,000 new posters and six
new designs – including one of the people tearing down the posters.
The Aussie Posters project has been under way for nearly a decade, sparked by a
wave of anti-Islamic sentiment in Australia in the wake of the Lindt cafe
siege.
Drew went on the hunt for pictures of people who applied for exemptions to the
White Australia policy.
“I was already into archival images before then,” he says. “I looked at the
photographs here in Adelaide first and found some great shots. But it wasn’t
until I was at the Melbourne archive, the national archive, and I found the
image of Monga Khan.
“And as soon as I saw that, I thought, well, this is it. This is the
centrepiece, and he was unknown.
“I sort of wanted to find people who weren’t famous, who were just people you’d
bump into on the street, and that would be more effective.”
The picture of Monga Khan, with his striking profile, moustache and turban, was
taken in 1916. As a hawker – a critical part of the economy – he applied for an
exemption so he could go home to India and then return.
Drew wants his designs – screen-printed on craft paper – to get people thinking
about national identity."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
