We are Artists, Designers, Illustrators, Photographers, Painters, Teachers and Learners. First and foremost, we’re creative thinkers dedicated to bringing a glass half full attitude to everything we do. From rural Australian silo murals to laneways in Nepal, we strive to bring colour and empowerment to communities everywhere.
Wasp Elder is a socially engaged artist whose aim is to paint murals that communicate varying levels of history and social-poetics with people and in place. He often paints pictures populated by figures and unstressed backgrounds, enticing a sentiment of an obscure journey. His paintings present an evocative combination of solitary figures, collaged scenes, close-ups and obscured features. Through this working process he is able to present often marginalised figures through a dignified representation. Sam also co-ran a DIY multi functional art-space called The Abacus as well as a street art project called Empty Walls. He has collaborated on many projects across the world and continues to use his experiences to learn about people, place and environment.
Xandolino is a Brisbane based Brazilian artist with a background in architecture and graphic design. His art is about responding to the moment, and the environment surrounding him. He uses collections of simple shapes and colours to build patterns. Although the end result is often abstract, people can find unintentionally hidden figures in his pieces. His inspirations include old maps, nature, board games, puzzles, graffiti, electronics, people, music, mechanisms, comic books, history, etc. In his own words: “While I am creating it feels like turning my logical mind off and flowing with the unconscious, with small steps back to check the overall result. It is an intricate relationship between random and systematic.”
Born in 1990 in Bogotá, Colombia, Zurik is a graffiti writer who started drawing and painting at the age of 9. In 2009, while studying Graphic Design at the National University of Colombia, she began to paint on the street, influenced by the challenge of construction and deciphering graffiti letters. Through self-learning, she developed an exploration of new constructions and color combinations, leading her to the path that she continues on to this day. Currently Zurik is based in Sabadell/Barcelona choosing to devote herself full–time to painting, taking up certain forgotten parts of the study of drawing, traveling and exploring new ways (for her) to integrate recognizable elements with her letters, without losing the essence of what it means the role itself. For her, the technique above the concept remains almost an unbreakable norm, giving the latter a secondary position in what is to paint graffiti.
Reuben Stocks aka Dank Zappa is an established graffiti artist and an emerging fine artist. His background is in pen and spraycan skills. His inspiration comes from the street, global graffiti culture, underground music and the influence of the fine art world in childhood. His profound reflective inner self and the unknown realities of our outer multiverses are tangible in his work. His ability to visually distill that which is organic and universal together with street culture Phunk into a singular current of production is completely mesmerising.
Perfecting his craft since 1997, Joos ‘DOES’ van Barneveld is a multidisciplinary international artist recognised for his well balanced colour schemes, clean style and eye for detail. Taking root in graffiti art, traditional letterform is DOES’s primary love. He maintains that different hand styles betray elements of their owners’ emotional landscapes, putting personality traits subconsciously on display. Using the letters D, O, E and S as a foundation, he continues to elevate these etchings to new heights. Through an explosion of colour and shape, letters assume narrative.
Elysha Rei is a Japanese-Australian visual artist whose work draws upon her mixed heritage and lived experiences between places, cultures and communities. Her works are created from personal and historical archives which embed narrative and symbolism within a Japanese design aesthetic. Works include portraits, patterns and paper cutting which have been translated into large-scale murals and installation commissions. Since completing a Bachelor of Visual Arts in 2008, Rei has created and exhibited work, curated exhibitions and managed cultural spaces across Australia, Japan, Thailand, New Zealand and the US.
In the studio, Gus Eagleton paints with oils on canvas to create photo-realistic yet surreal interpretations of the reality and beauty of our urban landscape. On the street, he explores the individual in nature, juxtaposed against the concrete city.
Shaun Lee, Gwarkabah (Saltwater man) also known by his artist name, Hafleg, is a Larrakia, Wardaman and Karajarri contemporary freelance artist born and raised in Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia. Shaun has been painting from a very young age learning from his large artistic family. He specialises in murals and logos using traditional and contemporary designs and especially enjoys doing one off pieces of art.
Irok was an accomplished artist from a young age growing up in the western suburbs of Brisbane with a graffiti and street art background. This introduced the artist to experimenting with all types of mediums outside of just spray paint. His work now has a strong, confident message and representation of his life and the surroundings around all of us seen through his eyes and presented to others in a very real, moving and visceral fashion with his unique use of brush and acrylic house paint. Originally the house paint watered down to save money, but this slowly became part of the the tell tale signs of the free flowing slightly chaotic yet organic splatters and drips that are generally outside the usual portrait artists focus on fine detail that became his signature work he is known for today. Irok sees his work as being progressive and versatile.
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