Making an entrance: One of Grenville Freeman’s artworks.
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Flying in from Hobart, Grenville Freeman will be making his debut at the Rochester Mural Festival, but don’t be deceived — this artist is a force to be reckoned with.
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Mr Freeman is no novice when it comes to competing at mural festivals, he is a recurring competitor in the Sheffield Mural Fest in Tasmania where he has collected two first place and two second place titles before.
He has been competing at Sheffield for about eight or nine years.
Australiana: Grenville’s second-place mural at Sheffield.
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As to why he has decided to come over to Rochester to compete, Mr Freeman said he met one of the other entrances at Sheffield some years ago who messaged him and asked him if he wanted to come on board this year which he accepted.
Mr Freeman said he has a habit of putting too many details into his paintings.
“I’m hoping I can get it done, it’s a lot of work for one person,” Mr Freeman said.
“Every time I do this thing, where I over commit to all of the details and put too many things in the mural.”
Mr Freeman said he got completely engrossed when he was painting a mural at a festival.
“You become like this animal that can’t be prodded or poked because you’re just focusing so hard,” he said.
“My son lives in Melbourne, and he said to me that he’d come and visit me, but I said you won’t get much out of me because I’ll be like a dog with a bone.”
Regardless of Mr Freeman’s attention being elsewhere, his son has decided that he will still come up to watch his dad paint away.
Mr Freeman discloses that he does not paint murals professionally outside of his time spent at mural festivals, in fact he does not paint very often at all.
Still, he enjoys the fast paced and competitive nature of mural festivals.
“It’s a little bit like a marathon, in a way,” Mr Freeman said.
He hopes he will have the opportunity to get to know the other artists who are competing.
“I like to meet other artists. You get to see how they do things. It is really interesting to see what their minds come up with.”
Mr Freeman started his own professional artistic career as a sign maker, which involved painting and working with woods, metals and plastics.
He later transitioned into creating sculptures and made a living out of selling small sculptured native animals at markets like the Hobart Market and the Salamanca Market.
“I’m working on some full-size horses at the moment which are made out of recycled roofing iron.”
Known for his artistic versatility, Mr Freeman has now been trying to get involved in creating street art in Hobart, by use of spray cans.
Trying new things: Grenville has been experimenting with spray paint.
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The clue for Mr Freeman’s Rochester mural piece is that it is a song which depicts the typical icons of Australia.
You can expect to see some First Nations componentry and representation in the mural.
“I like to add in Indigenous representation. Australia wouldn’t be anything without its Indigenous culture,” Mr Freeman said.
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