Mural Masterpieces - Hunter Region Botanic Gardens

Location:
Pacific Highway, Heatherbrae, New South Wales.

Team:
Teresa Purnell, Morgan Laudine.

Accessible to public:
Yes.

Mural theme:
Tropical orchids.

Background to mural creation:
Two students from Newcastle University, Teresa Purnell and Morgan Laudine, were given the opportunity to enhance the exterior walls of the tropical orchid house by designing, planning and painting a mural based on Noel Winney’s private orchid collection assembled over a 50 year period.

The orchid house is a gift from Noel Winney, Newcastle resident and long time volunteer at the Hunter Region Botanic Gardens at Heatherbrae.

The mural was also used as part of their course work in natural history illustration.

Botanica; illustration plays a big part in their course and while it was a challenge to undertake such a large scale project, the skills they had acquired allowed them to achieve a realistic and botanically correct result with the orchids.

Their aim was to use the bright and bold colours of large sized tropical orchids to attract the attention of visitors, thus transforming the somewhat bland external walls into a colourful artwork on the outside of the orchid house to match the beauty of the tropical orchids within.

The progress of the mural was documented and photographed each day. Journals, photographs and artworks were displayed as an exhibition in the main foyer.