Down a dog-legged street in the back of Collingwood, tucked below the railway line, there’s a wonderful piece of street art. It caught my eye in the way that the best street art does. Rather than shouting at passing pedestrians it quietly attracts your attention through a sideways glance. Then, like a moth to a flame, you can’t look away. The eye is hungry for the details of the faces, their expressions, their features, the way they have been painted around the windows and corners. And then you notice the magpie, quite small there in the upper corner, and naturally black and white, flying on the wall above all the mustachioed men.

Street Art. Bloomburg Street, Collingwood. Tom Gerrard, 2023.