That might explain why kids feature in
his creations for the festival.
“When I was looking for ideas, I noticed that paintings with children
look livelier,” he said. “Adults tend to be more shy,” he added, noting
that he works from his own photographs.
Close to a temple on Muntri Street, where you can still find George
Town’s 19th-century shophouses, it’s hard to miss Mr. Zacharevic’s huge,
playful painting of one of his eight-year-old students dressed in a
Wushu outfit. At ground level on Armenian Street, two life-size siblings
ride on the back of a mountain bike (only the bicycle, propped against
the wall, is real).
- Ernest Zacharevic
- This work by the artist features a real bicycle.
To date, the artist has completed three of the six works commissioned
by the festival and is slated to finish the remainder before the event
ends next month. Meanwhile, he has been flooded with new requests.
“People just started coming to my office offering their wall[s],” he
said.
Mr. Zacharevic isn’t the first person in the city to experiment with
street art. In 2010, the government launched a contest that called for
creatives to brand the city with their designs in an effort to promote
George Town’s status as a Unesco World Heritage site. The winning entry,
from Kuala Lumpur firm Sculpture At Work, installed over 200 caricature
sculptures across the city’s walls, pavements and phone booths,
including a two-dimensional tribute to
Penang native son Jimmy Choo, the shoe designer.
It’s no surprise, then, that Mr. Zacharevic’s work has been met with
open arms by George Town residents and authorities, though street
painting in tropical Malaysia has proved to be a challenge. His Armenian
Street image of the old man is already fading due to the heat, rain and
humidity, prompting him to experiment with different paints to make his
artworks more durable.
As for future projects, the artist remains open-minded. “A Chinese
temple wanted me to paint on a building that is in a remote, isolated
island, where no one even goes,” he said. “But then I thought that this
could be an interesting project, so why not?”
Street Arts Paints Penang
George Town Festival runs through July 15.
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