The 2024 Benalla Street Art Festival will see walls, laneways, and even an underground car park transformed into an outdoor gallery from Thursday, March 21 to Thursday, March 28.

Curator Eddie Zammit said the rebranded event would have a new format to the previous three-day Wall to Wall festival in the town, which last took place in 2019 before it was halted by COVID restrictions, with an extension to seven days and "a changing of the guard" with new artists.

Internationals Amanda Valdes (USA), DXTR (Germany) and REKA, an Australian based in Malta, feature in the 15-artist lineup. They will be alongside the North East's Minna Leunig and Tim Bowtell and fellow Australian creatives David Bromley, Buff Diss, Melanie Caple, Shepparton Indigenous artist Tommy Day, Lisa King, David Lee Pereira, Merda, Travis Price, Sofles and Neryl Walker.

"It's been five years since the previous festival. It's really great for a community like Benalla to rally around this, not only for the art and culture, but also for the local businesses," Mr Zammit said.

"Everyone is bringing something unique. About 12 of the artists have only been involved in three street art festivals or less, but are quite well known for their large murals.

"What I'm trying to achieve is a changing of the guard with a fresh lineup for Benalla."

Mr Zammit said artists had been assigned various spaces to create murals, while additional events such as screenings of Bromley's documentary Bromley: Light After Dark on Sunday and Monday night at Benalla Cinema, and King's collaboration with farmer and producer Mark Foletta to provide an immersive experience at Benalla Town Hall would also be highlights.

"These artists are really well known in the street art or graffiti scene, so it is really trying to push forward the culture and using Benalla as the canvas," he said.

"In decades gone past, Benalla might have just been a stopover on the Hume Freeway, but really the idea is to make it into a destination by using art as the motivator. I'd love to have more than 7000 people come through.

"In previous years, the festival formerly known as Wall to Wall had gone for three days, but I wanted to extend it to a week. One, it allows the artists to create larger murals and also it allows people to stay around the town longer and that comes back to the economic driver of the local businesses."

Brisbane-based street artist Sofles said he was excited to return to Benalla after featuring at Wall to Wall in 2017 and launching an exhibition in the town in 2020, which was cut short by COVID lockdowns.

Sofles will paint the underground car park at Benalla Library and large canvases to be shown within the art gallery.

"I'm painting all of the roof of the underneath car park, so I'm getting my Michelangelo on and making sure I don't get a sore neck on that one," he said.

"I'm painting all the pillars and there's a couple of walls underneath the roof. It's quite a large scale space and they will be using it for events and different things.

"Because it's such a large space, I'm doing some big abstract work with lots of colours and blending it together with some pattern work over the top.

"For the art gallery, I'm doing some big cartoon faces mixed with graffiti influence."

Sofles said there was often hesitancy from the community when a town first hosted a street art festival, but the impact they have had on places such as Benalla could not be understated.

"I think the local community feel a sense of ownership over some pretty amazing artwork after it's all done and they can see a lot of the benefits that come from it," he said.

"This one has a few points of difference, especially this year, with Eddie Zammit curating, he's got some really different artists. He's giving people who don't always paint at these festivals an opportunity to paint some big walls, which is pretty amazing."

For further information, visit benallastreetartfestival.com.au.