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You don't look at the new mural in Vine St and connect it to a missus getting the bash, or kids left locked in a car outside a pub.

The messages in the mural by Whangarei artists Trent Morgan and Dave Beazley are more subtle than that _ if subtle is the right word for the artwork along a wall between Vine and Rose Sts. It's an uplifting, feel-good, pro-family kind of picture. But woven into its cheery surface are messages we hear every day about not so loved-up sides of life _ anti-abuse and anti-prejudice messages like ``it's not ok'', ``It's ok to ask for help'', ``stand tall'' and ``speak out''. Morgan says the work is based on ``strength messaging'' and imagery that aims to connect with all areas of positive family and community life.

``There are spiritual and physical benefits of getting out and actively connecting with the environment,'' he says. ``Like the four walls of a whare, the hauora of this work reflects on the importance physical, mental, social and spiritual wellbeing has on our whanau ora, our family wellbeing.''

It's not a bad topic to be reflecting on a few days before Children's Day, on Wednesday, November 24 _ love and affection being this year's theme. We might reflect on it again, more deeply, the next day on White Ribbon Day, November 25, designated by the United Nations as the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. But back to metaphors about urban wastelands and a bereft human spirit ...

Among reasons the Vine St wall was crying out for a mural-with-a-message is the location itself _ a dingy, drunken, brawling, nightclub strip at worst; a dingy, featureless carpark at best. Ironically, the Salvation Army tenants the building on the other side of the mural. While the Sallies battle on one side of Vine St to raise money for the needy, clubs called Danger, Danger and Heaven have been firing up customers across the road. For years Vine St has been Northland's boozy, brawling capital. But messages about bountiful nature and good family values now beat in Vine St's heart. ``The overall theme of the design is nature,'' Morgan says. ``We think a connection and reconnection to the land and the natural environment can play a part in tackling family violence.'' O THER agencies agreed with those sentiments when they got behind the mural project and other family violence campaigns. For Whangarei District Council, the owner of the Vine St carpark, the mural particularly has been a win-win initiative. ``We get the benefit of seeing a big open space that has been vandalised, is looking tired, derelict and potentially unsafe become a bright, open, well-maintained space that the community is involved in, without any burden of cost on the ratepayer's already stretched dollar,'' says the council's property and community services manager Mike Hibbert. ``It is not every day a project joins together agencies that normally work in fairly separate areas, like social development, crime prevention, arts promotion and public asset management, but it shows so clearly the things that can be achieved when a project does.'' It is unsurprising perhaps, but rare, that money and support for Ministry of Social Development-headed Northland initiatives _ the most out-there perhaps being the mural _ have come from Whangarei District Council, GenerationALL, Northern Promotion Trust (now CHART), Bream Bay Community Services Trust and Northland Intersectoral Forum (NIF).

The initiatives include supporting the White Ribbon campaign that it's not okay to give the wife or kids the bash. (There's a poignant twist in that men in prison for violent offending make the campaign's white ribbons.)

Horrifying, the statistics the campaign uses say one in three women is, or has at least once been, a victim of violence from a partner. On average, 14 women a year _ that's half the number of women murdered in New Zealand _ are killed by a family member. National spokeswoman for It's Not Ok Trish Green said giving visibility to family violence was important as the issue had been hidden behind closed doors for so long. The campaign had made it a priority to partner with local bodies and encourage the use of public spaces to spread the message, Ms Green said. ``The new, vibrant mural in Whangarei is an excellent example.'' In Whangarei, the MSD has also been a major player in helping Bream Bay Community Trust get vans decked out in White Ribbon insignia . Showing some muscle _ muscle cars, that is _ the trust that actively campaigns against violence is putting on the White Ribbon Ride from Takahiwai to Mangawhai and back next weekend. All bikes are welcome but cars, whether hot rod or modified, must be classic in origin. All entrants have to sign a pledge supporting the elimination of violence toward women and children, there'll be no grog or drugs, no gang patches, and the entry fee is a box of non-perishable food for women's refuges.

Now, isn't that another nice community picture?