Arts and Cultural Development Officer
Phone: 9550 3842

There is no doubt that Mandurah is a fun and exciting place to live.  Artists young and old, professional and amateur – whether singing in harmony, applying paint to a canvas, pirouetting on a sprung floor or putting pen to paper are the heartbeat of our city.

The City of Mandurah recognises that an inclusive, active and community based arts program maintains a sense of place and promotes our culture to the wider world.  Our culture – what is that?  It’s our landscape, our heritage, our lifestyle, the colours and textures in our environment and the way we express ourselves creatively through our festivals, exhibitions, performances and art in public spaces.

Each year the City of Mandurah supports an array of arts and cultural projects through its programs, services and grants program.  From creative writing workshops, choirs, bell ringing, textile exhibitions, pageants, heritage trails, concert bands, street theatre, public art, African drumming classes to the annual Stretch festival.

Every May the community is invited to participate in an arts and cultural festival that celebrates all that is good about living in Mandurah.  The autumn Stretch festival sets out to ‘stretch’ people’s experience of the arts.  It challenges our community to think differently about what art is.  Through the workshops held in the community prior to the festival it provides opportunities for practising artists, and for those who never thought of themselves as artists, to acquire new skills. 

Along the eastern foreshore is the heritage art walk - a series of statues and mosaics that depict people, events and activities from times gone by.  A community’s culture grows from its geography and people.  The ocean and the estuary with its adjoining rivers were an essential part of the way of life for the Binjareb Bilyidar people of the Bibbulmum Nation who inhabited this region before the arrival of Thomas Peel and his settlement party from Britain.  The sea and the waterways remain the iconic feature of Mandurah life today and are reflected in the public art walk.

For information on arts and crafts groups in Mandurah please refer to the Community Directory.