ART BEHIND BARS: Murals and Graffiti of Fremantle Prison

AUSTRALIAN ART WEST AUSTRALIANA

SCARCE. Colour illusts pp. 60 #1220/220723 (Still in publisher’s unopened wrap.)

After 136 years of operations Fremantle Prison closed on 30 November 1991. The majority of its inmates were transferred to the newly constructed prison complex at Casuarina.

When the prisoners and prison guards left, they took their personal belongings and memories with them. Overnight the Prison became an empty shell, dispossessed of the human element that gave it life.

One thing the prisoners could not take was the artworks, murals, graffiti and poetry they had marked on the walls of their cells and in the exercise yards.