Punk uses fire extinguisher to spray yellow paint all over Woodside headquarters to protest destruction of sacred rock art and climate
Monday 12 February 09.30AM AWST – Perth
A local punk has used a fire extinguisher to spray bright yellow paint all over the front of Woodside’s corporate headquarters in Perth as the ‘Disrupt Burrup Hub’ campaign escalates its targeting of Woodside’s Burrup Hub.
‘Disrupt Burrup Hub’ is demanding no more industry on the Burrup.
Last Friday, Murujuga rock art was nominated for UNESCO world heritage status amid warnings about the Burrup Hub damaging sacred First Nations culture and the climate.
At 9.30am Monday AWST, Trent Rojahn, a musician who is the lead singer for legendary Perth punk band ‘Last Quokka’, coated the Woodside building with a fire extinguisher full of high-pressure yellow paint.
Rojahn then used spray cans to spray the slogan ‘Disrupt Burrup Hub’ in yellow paint across the glass at the entrance to Woodside’s corporate headquarters.
Rojahn explained that Woodside risks destroying culture and climate with toxic emissions from the Burrup Hub.
He explained that the yellow paint currently coating Woodside’s corporate headquarters in Perth represents the toxic emissions that the Burrup Hub is spraying all over sacred Murujuga rock art and the global climate.
Trent Rojahn, a musician who is the lead singer for legendary Perth punk band ‘Last Quokka’, said of the protest:
“Let me paint a picture. Sacred Murujuga rock art was just nominated for UNESCO World Heritage listing. Woodside’s Burrup Hub is pumping out 6 billion tons of carbon dioxide right on top of the oldest, largest art collection in the world. The WA government has delayed nominating Murujuga for world heritage status until they’re sure that industry have got all the sign-offs they need already. Woodside and the WA government are painting with the same brush. They must abandon their plans to expand the Burrup Hub.”
Woodside’s Burrup Hub is a massive cluster of gas and fertiliser plants, including the biggest beast of all, the Browse Basin gas project coming down the pipeline. The yellow paint on Woodside’s headquarters in Perth is symbolic. The Burrup Hub is spraying toxic shit on top of sacred rock art and fucking up our climate.”
The Burrup Peninsula in Western Australia is known as Murujuga to traditional custodians, a deeply sacred place that contains the largest, oldest collection of Aboriginal rock art in the world. This priceless cultural treasure is currently nominated for UNESCO world heritage listing, but the sacred songlines and stories contained in these carvings are being damaged by emissions from the Burrup Hub and face total destruction within decades.
Woodside's Burrup Hub is the biggest new fossil fuel project in Australia. It consists of the Scarborough and Browse Basin gas fields, the Pluto Project processing plant, and other linked liquified natural gas (LNG) and fertiliser plants on the Burrup Peninsula in WA’s remote north-west Pilbara region. The Burrup Hub is projected to produce more than 6 billion tons of CO2 by 2070, making it four times larger than the Adani coal mine and one of the biggest carbon bombs in the world.
On January 19, Joana Partyka, a ceramic artist and illustrator from Perth, sprayed the Woodside logo in yellow paint on the colonial masterpiece ‘Down on His Luck’ at the Art Gallery of WA. On Friday February 10, Partyka pled guilty to criminal damage at court in Perth and was sentenced to pay $7500 in fines and costs, a charge labelled “absurdly excessive” by Human Rights Watch. The protest was subsequently endorsed by the descendants of ‘Down on His Luck’ painter Frederick McCubbin.
Police have been called. More to come…
