General News
5 March, 2026
A view of ghostly signs
THE Camperdown Courthouse will have a ghostly feel this month as a photographer shows of the various ghost signs of the shire.
Patrick Caruana’s exhibition ‘Ghost signs, some not so ghostly and a few historical whimseys’ will see 20 photos of historical signage from Camperdown, Noorat and Terang on display for the month of March.
Mr Caruana said he was inspired by three Instagram-based photographers – Sean Reynolds, Warren Kirk and Elio Sarpi – who have similar imagery.
“I thought this shire has a huge potential for a lot of ghost signs, and what I found was after exploring Camperdown, Noorat and Terang amazed me,” he said.
“I’ve got hundreds of photos – I haven’t even started on the rest of the towns in the shire.
“I had to look at culling it down to the photos which I have here, and I will do the other towns over the course of the year.
“Hopefully I will have an exhibition next year for the other towns, and my ultimate aim is to get a photo book – a bit like Sean’s book Ghost Signs of Melbourne, I would like to do Ghost Signs of Corangamite.
“We’ve got such potential here.”
A photographer for over 55 years, Mr Caruana said he was pleased to be able to share his art at the monthly exhibitions at the Camperdown Courthouse and hopes to inspire the community to look around their area.
“I hope they get inspired to look at the world around them, to take in the history because we have such a great history in this shire and to take that and look around themselves and maybe spot their own ghost signs no-one has seen before,” he said.
“It’s an addictive interest – once you start doing this, you go to other places and start looking.
“One important thing that this project has done is made me slow down, look up, look sideways and look down and be present in our surroundings and enjoy where we live.
“I hope to inspire people to look and be present in the world around them.
“I want people to come and have a look, to wander around Corangamite and have a look at the signs in real life.”