Annette Green and Damian Modra, self-described regional tourism ambassadors, had an ambitious idea last March to publish a silo art calendar.
Sales of the inaugural 2021 calendar has allowed them to raise money for the 14 communities featured.
“In those crazy COVID-19 lockdown periods, everyone involved in tourism industries had been hit hard, so Annette and I wanted to coordinate our efforts to promote regional tourism ready for when we could travel again, and also offer some financial support for the communities that had worked hard to have their local silos painted,” Mr Modra said.
“Planning and designing the calendar took a lot of effort.
“Not only did we need to source great photos, we also needed to meet all copyright laws and artist moral rights by seeking approval from the artists and silo owners to use their creative artwork for our calendar.”
Ms Green said it took a lot of work to put the calendar together.
“Permission was granted on the proviso that we would donate 50 per cent of the profits from the sale of the calendar, directly to the towns that will be featured,” Ms Green said.
“We set ourselves a personal target to try and donate more than $1000 to each of the 14 communities and we are very proud that we will exceed this amount with more than $4000 being given back to each small regional town.
“Sales of the inaugural calendar was phenomenal and in the end we had three print runs.
“The feedback we have been given has been truly fantastic and we feel very proud to play our part in promoting the silo art trail around Australia and giving some financial reward back.
“Australian Silo Art Trail was initially created to catalogue the silos and provide a simple map of the silo art locations nationally.
“At that time there was no dedicated tourism body promoting these great tourist attractions collectively as one national trail — and there still isn’t.”
The Australian Silo Art Trail Facebook Group now has more than 67,000 members.
While many state borders are closed there is still an opportunity for people to travel within Victoria and a visit to our local silo art is always a great day out.
To find out more about the the North East Art Trail, go to: www.nearttrail.org.au
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