THE 92-year-old Newport substation was so badly vandalised a decade ago, its graffiti-stained walls, broken windows and leaking roof housed only the occasional desperate squatter and hundreds of pigeons.
Today, thanks to the hard work and vision of local artists, tradesmen and volunteers, the red-brick building will soon undergo the final stage of a $1.5 million transformation to make it one of Australia’s special arts centres.
“This is an iconic building for Newport and all of Melbourne,” said Darren Williams, president of the Hobsons Bay Community Arts Centre.
“The vision was there right from the start to do something special with it.”
Along with fellow Newport resident Nigel Edwards, Mr Williams, a glazier, turned an idea to restore the building’s neo-classical arched windows into blueprints for a community arts centre.
An initial face-lift on the four-storey building began in 2001.
Organisers used 180 long-term unemployed to clean the building, repair its magnificent windows and reconnect utilities in a work-for-the-dole program with Victoria University.
Since then, Mr Williams said, the building had become the venue for the Tattersalls Contemporary Art Prize that draws hundreds of entries from across Australia, as well as for short periods of student and community exhibitions between construction.
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Over the next 18 months, a performance floor, cafe, lifts and art and music studios will be added.
“We will try to focus on local arts, because that’s our support into the future, but we’re also open to expanding Hobsons Bay’s art horizons,” he said.
Known fondly as “the substation”, the centre is expected to become a regionally recognised venue for teaching, presenting and creating all facets of the arts.
A business plan calls for the substation to become financially self-sustaining, with artist tenants paying to rent studios or hold exhibitions, as well as business and government sponsorship.
The make-over would be a fitting transformation for a building that for 50 years delivered power to the rail lines that linked the suburbs to Melbourne and assisted in the West’s development, Mr Williams said.
