Bunbury Street Art: Exploring the City’s Colourful Murals

Street art is one of my favourite things to seek out when I’m travelling, so when people kept telling me not to miss the murals in Bunbury, I knew I had to take a look.

And Bunbury makes it particularly easy. The city centre is filled with large-scale murals, colourful laneways and smaller pieces of public art, with more than 40 large-scale murals across the city.

You can easily spend a couple of hours wandering the streets looking for them, and best of all, it’s completely free.

Here’s how to find the Bunbury street art, a little about how it all began, and some of my favourite works from our visit.

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The Bunbury Street Art Story

Bunbury’s street art scene really took off with ReDiscover, an urban art project created by local creative collective Six Two Three Zero.

The project began in 2014, bringing established and emerging Australian and international artists into Bunbury to transform walls throughout the CBD.

Artists involved in that first year included Stormie Mills, Kyle Hughes-Odgers, Anya Brock, Jodee Knowles, Tim Howe and local artist Andrew Frazer.

More artists and murals followed in subsequent years, turning the city centre into a walkable outdoor gallery and helping establish Bunbury as a destination for street art.

Of course, street art is constantly changing. Murals can fade, disappear or be replaced, so what you find when you visit may not be exactly what I saw.

Finding the Bunbury Street Art

Street art can sometimes be surprisingly difficult to find. Murals are often tucked down laneways, hidden behind buildings or painted on walls you’d never see unless you knew where to look.

I’ve spent plenty of time wandering around cities peering down side streets looking for murals – including in Hobart and Mildura – but Bunbury makes things much easier.

The City of Bunbury has a Bunbury Street Art Map showing murals around the CBD, so download the latest version before you start exploring.

Allow around two hours for a relaxed wander, particularly if you like stopping to take photos.

And don’t assume the mapped murals are all there is. You’ll find other pieces of public art around Bunbury too, so keep your eyes open as you wander.

The map is a great starting point, but finding an unexpected mural is half the fun.

My Favourite Bunbury Murals

There are plenty of murals around Bunbury, and I don’t want to show you every one before you get there.

Instead, these are a few of my favourites from our wander around the city. Remember that street art is temporary by nature, so some works may have changed or disappeared since our visit.

“Green Thumb” by Tim Howe

Tim Howe was one of the artists involved in the first ReDiscover project in 2014, creating “Green Thumb” during Bunbury’s early street-art transformation.

The work features a woman holding a tiny tree in the palm of her hand, with her striking blue hair immediately catching your attention.

It was one of the murals that stood out to me as we explored the city and a great example of just how varied Bunbury’s street art can be.

“Mr Brainwash” by Stormie Mills

Stormie Mills was another of the artists involved in the original ReDiscover project .

“Mr Brainwash” was painted the following year when he returned to the streets in 2015. Look out for his other works while you are exploring too.

His style is distinctive, so once you’ve seen one of his works, you’ll probably recognise others.

His characters often appear in a restricted palette of black, white, grey and silver, giving them a slightly melancholy feel.

I’d already come across Stormie Mills’ work while exploring street art elsewhere in Australia, so it was great to see more of it in Bunbury.

“Sarah and Teresa” by Rone

Melbourne artist Rone joined ReDiscover in 2016, painting one of his distinctive portraits in the rear car park off Stephen Street.

If you’re familiar with Australian street art, there’s a good chance you’ll recognise his style. He is particularly known for large-scale portraits of women, often with a soft, slightly haunting quality.

I love the simplicity of his portraits. They don’t need bright colours or complicated backgrounds to grab your attention, and his Bunbury work was one of my favourites.

ReDiscover Jam Wall

Not all of Bunbury’s street art comes in the form of huge, carefully planned murals.

The South’s WA Jam Wall, created as part of ReDiscover in 2016, brought together a group of artists in the laneway connecting Wellington and Prinsep Streets.

The artwork here had a completely different feel, with smaller pieces sitting alongside – and sometimes blending into – each other.

This is the sort of street art I love stumbling across: tucked away down a laneway and a little different from the huge feature murals.

Historical Mural by Jerome Davenport (Ketones6000)

Another mural that caught our attention was this huge historical work by Jerome Davenport, also known as Ketones6000.

Painted in 2019, it stretches across two sides of a building and uses imagery connected to Bunbury’s timber and port history.

We actually spotted more of Davenport’s work just a few days later in nearby Collie – another WA town with an impressive collection of murals.

“The Storm” by Fintan Magee

“The Storm” by Australian artist Fintan Magee was one of the biggest and most striking murals we saw in Bunbury.

Created as part of ReDiscover in 2015, the huge work was painted on the south-facing wall of the Grand Cinema.

It depicts a woman on her hands and knees with a house on her back, an image connected to Magee’s exploration of housing, displacement and natural disasters.

Even without knowing the story behind it, its sheer scale made this one worth seeking out.

Portrait of a Man by Claire Foxton

I first came across Claire Foxton’s work in Port Adelaide, where she created a mural as part of the Wonderwalls Festival in 2017.

Not long before that, she had painted this striking portrait of an older man in Bunbury.

There isn’t a lot of readily available information about the story behind this particular work, but it was another piece that caught my attention.

I always enjoy finding Claire Foxton’s work when I’m exploring Australian street art.

Bunbury Regional Gallery by Bradley Eastman (Beastman)

Another very different piece was the colourful geometric mural by Bradley Eastman, better known as Beastman, at the Bunbury Regional Art Gallery.

Created in 2015, the mural was painted in the rear car park of the gallery and is instantly recognisable thanks to Beastman’s bold geometric style.

His work draws heavily on patterns and forms found in nature, and it’s quite a contrast to the portrait murals elsewhere around Bunbury.

While you’re there, it’s worth taking a look inside the Bunbury Regional Art Gallery (BRAG) too. It’s housed in Bunbury’s distinctive former convent building on Wittenoom Street and entry is free.

Out of the Box

While you’re searching for Bunbury’s big murals, keep an eye on the smaller pieces of street art too.

Outside the Box was another Six Two Three Zero project, transforming 20 electrical boxes around the Bunbury CBD into artworks.

My favourites were the quirky little creatures by WA artist Hayley Welsh. They’re easy to miss when you’re concentrating on the huge murals, so remember to look closer to ground level too.

Hayley Welsh also created a larger mural for ReDiscover in 2016 – but I’ll leave you to discover that one for yourself.

A Little About Bunbury, Western Australia

Bunbury is around two hours south of Perth, making it an easy addition to a road trip through southwest Western Australia.

We visited while travelling from Esperance towards Perth, after spending a few days exploring the Margaret River region.

The street art was one of the things that drew me to Bunbury, but there’s plenty more to see while you’re here. The city has beaches, a waterfront and, perhaps most famously, its local bottlenose dolphins.

At the Dolphin Discovery Centre, wild dolphins sometimes visit the Interaction Zone in the shallow water directly in front of the centre.

There’s no guarantee they’ll appear – they are completely wild – but visits are most common during the mornings in the warmer months.

If they do arrive, visitors may be invited to stand in the shallows under the supervision of the centre’s volunteers. You cannot touch, feed or swim with the dolphins in the Interaction Zone.

We visited in May and saw dolphins swimming out in the bay, but none came into the Interaction Zone while we were there.

If you’re travelling through southwest WA, I’d allow enough time to explore more than just the murals – Bunbury is worth more than simply a quick stop on the way through.

Exploring the Bunbury Street Art

Bunbury’s street art turned out to be one of the highlights of our time in the city.

I love street art trails because they give me an excuse to wander down streets and laneways I might otherwise miss, and Bunbury has plenty to discover.

Allow a couple of hours, download the latest street-art map and see how many you can find – but remember to keep looking beyond the mapped works too.

And if you’re continuing your Western Australia road trip, you might also like my guide to Things to Do on Rottnest Island in Winter.

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