Charcoal Stories.
A Chrysalis Project in collaboration with Vernon Ah Kee, Avid Reader and Tim Bennetton Architects and sponsored by Resane Paints.

See their name. Say their name.
Vernon Ah Kee’s homage to local writers, writ large at Avid Reader.
It takes a Village to make a landmark mural.

Charcoal Stories was seeded in late 2020 by Bec Mac and Carmel Haugh during the COVID crisis to employ artists, revitalise the struggling Boundary Street shops, and bring the West End community together.

The flagship creation of Chrysalis Projects 4101 has transformed the literary hub of Brisbane’s iconic West End – Avid Reader – into a major landmark public artwork by globally recognised, Brisbane based, contemporary artist Vernon Ah Kee.

The mural wraps around the bookstore and celebrates a curated list of Brisbane authors, whose names fill square tiles in Ah Kee’s signature bold black and white text. This mosaic of word play is overlaid by dark surfboard shields, which feature the names of Brisbane’s Aboriginal authors in Ah Kee’s own handwriting.

The work was crowd sourced funding with the Chrysalis Team raising $62000.

The work is a testament to the power of art in place.