Mirka's Trams
MIRKA’S TRAM
by Joan Auld
`Painting on a little canvas drives me up the wall! It has always been my dream to do big murals.’ Mirka MoraIn 1979, a number of artists selected by the Ministry for the Arts, began to paint a Melbourne tram. The idea was to take art to the public in an imaginative way and to arouse interest in what contemporary artists were doing. Over the following four years, a total of 16 trams were painted. These moving works of art trundled round the tracks for many years, and as each new one was `launched’ it caused much comment. Though not all artworks pleased everyone, they provided a conversation-starter to passengers, gave great joy to many commuters and bystanders, and attracted interest from around the world.
This first batch of painted trams broke new ground for the Melbourne and Metropolitan Tramways Board (MMTB). They were the forerunners of a second group of artist-painted trams, and of course, the now familiar advertising trams also often referred to as `Painted Trams’.
Mirka Mora, previously a resident of Barkly Street, St Kilda, and in partnership with her former husband Georges, proprietor of Tolarno Restaurant and Gallery in Fitzroy Street, was one of the first artists to paint a tram. In 1981, as a mature-age Art student, I chose to do a series of interviews with the tram artists, and as result, met Mirka. Late last year at the instigation of Prue Grieve, and with the enthusiastic support of Jet Trask, of the St Kilda Historical Society, my project was resurrected, and with several works loaned by the artists, it filled the glass display case in the foyer of the St Kilda Library for the months of February and March in 2001. When I interviewed her, Mirka was living in a wonderful inner-city warehouse space, close enough to the GPO to hear the striking of its clock: `It was very exciting to do the first tram. I had just finished `Tympan’ (20ft x 15ft) at Realities Gallery with four other artists.’
This collaborative work is based on the architectural form of tympanum at the main entrance to Gothic Cathedrals. Mirka’s section contains many elements of the designs on her tram, sombre-eyed angels and double-headed beasties intertwined with stylized vegetation.
`I first had a letter from Eric Westbrook, the Director of the Ministry for the Arts, inviting me to be one of the first six painters to do a tram. It was inspiring to do something for the street -- the ultimate project `for people’. I regard it as a celebration for Melbourne-- the people in the tram come first. Painters love to work on a big space, and it is good because it develops a painter’s work. Because it was a tram and would be full of people, I regarded it as a kind of church, and if the church could be decorated with imaginative monsters -- why couldn’t I decorate the tram in that way? My motifs were suggested by designs in Owen Jones’ Propositions, also Styles of Ornament by Spetz and Spiers. Inspiration came also from Greek mythology, ancient Roman times and a mixture of styles from different countries.’
She spent three months researching and planning the design and doing the preparatory drawings. Ornamentation derived from folk and tribal art features in Mirka’s paintings. This is allied to fanciful imagery of angels, seemingly innocent lovers, vegetation, animals and birds, hybrid creatures, half-human, half-beast or bird, suggested by images from mythology, as well as from the subconscious. Along one side at the top of the tram geometric patterns run in strips. The upper border on the other side is a large black snake, but she points out that it is a 'universal snake’, rather than one related to the Aboriginal Rainbow Serpent. However, there is no mistaking an Australian touch in the large koala grasping an un-eucalypt-like branch of foliage, and with a gaze that is either quizzical or inebriated. 'I use signs in my painting -- the language of signs.’ Mirka wanted the colours to be submissive to her designs.
'Because the tram is in the street, I wanted it to be inspiring and I wanted to use colours people like. I wanted my tram to have a dream-like quality. Colour is a language as well as being an important part of the design. People in Africa, for example, use colour as a language: black is night; brown is earth; blue is sky; red is life; green is the greeneries of nature; white is air or water. `I used only 4 colours and wanted the colours to be unveiled as the tram approached the onlooker. `It was very exciting to see it for the first time in the daylight. Other artists realise that my painting on the tram works well. Inside I wrote some verses by Edward Lear. I wanted all the little children going to school every morning by tram to try themselves with the letters.’
The workmen at the Preston Workshops where the trams were painted were interested observers of the works in progress. Mirka involved many of them in her work. She tells of one who always wore a football beanie, and when she painted one of these caps on an angel, there was much excitement in the paint-shop.
'I asked each of the men working in the paint-shop at Preston to choose a letter. One man asked me to do 'Y’ for oysters -- why, I don’t know. I think perhaps there may have been a story there, perhaps he met his wife on the beach. We were promised we could have an apprentice to help us. I had one for one day, then he was taken away which made me quite sad.’
At the time that she was planning the tram designs, Mirka was part of an Education Department artist-in-residence scheme in a school. Because the children were working on a Cyclops painting, Mirka put 'a baby Cyclops on the tram, with a bird on its head for protection, as it only has one eye.’
At the front and back of the tram, where the headlights are, there is a giant moth or butterfly, facing the world and 'daring danger’, as the moth does when circling the flame. Referring to the artist-painted trams, many people, including the artists, have asked us: 'Where are they now?’ They were all auctioned off in 1987, and most were put out to pasture - literally. Only three are still intact, and can accounted for: Mirka’s was bought by friends, and is now on a private property on the Mornington Peninsula; Clifton Pugh’s is part of the Tramways Heritage Fleet; Les Kossatz’ tram was sold to the City of Seattle, USA, and repainted in MMTB livery.
Editor's comment; In December 2001, as the guest speaker at the St Kilda Historical Society’s 30 year anniversary, Mirka Mora displayed the vivacity, sense of humor and passion characteristic of her life and art.