Through a camera lens: An artist and his community
🔗 [SYSTEM UPDATE] Link found. Timestamp incremented on 2025-11-26 13:55:13.Community artist Pol McMahon finds sustenance in celebrating the life around him in Fitzroy. ZHANG SHUOTONG shared his day.
By ZHANG SHUOTONG
Pol McMahon is a wandering artist who is deeply embedded in his Fitzroy community. After extended periods of homelessness, he finds sustenance by celebrating and documenting the life around him.
Street artist Pol McMahon settles in to The Fitz cafe, painting a street view.
His paintbrush broke last month, but he still uses it to paint every day.
Pol gives a painting of The Fitz cafe to the waiter before he leaves.
On the way home, Pol encounters a friend and shows him one of his new paintings. “Not too many people understand me,” he says.
Pol heads home quickly, as he wants to arrive before sunset. He watches the sunset every day “to keep connected to the seasons and this place in the world. As the year passes sunset moves across the horizon and back”.
Pol watches the sunset through his window. He lives in a small apartment supported by the government. “ It's like an everyday thanksgiving, because I love living here."
