“I don’t know where Guido got the image from. He takes photographs either of characters from the area or uses vintage photographs that he finds. This could be a vintage photograph. It’s a girl and the bit that’s going off to the side, that’s a bit abstract, that was lilies and roses in a lace effect over it. But it rained for a full day and a half and he only had three days so he didn’t get the finer detail done on that.

“He’s amazing because he doesn’t do a grid or anything. He has his phone, he has his image and he just plots it in his brain and uses the building. But I don’t know how he used that building because it’s got no squares. Simon says that Guido’s brain just works in another way. It does this thing that we can’t understand.

“Guido is really quiet and unassuming, he doesn’t have a big head, he’s a really lovely guy. He’s such an artist.

People love it. Everybody loved it.”

– Toni Noud, property owner, 1 Nov 2017

The old Whiteway Theatre wall site today with artwork – New Australian II (Wildflower) – by Guido van Helten

Photo by Nina Kourea