Canvas work & custom orders

For the last 8 years I have exhibited stencil art both here and in Japan. In these 8 years I have already had over 65 exhibitions in some of Australia's top lowbrow art galleries such as ChinaHeights in Sydney, Per Square Metre Gallery in Melbourne and the Bakery ArtRage Complex in Perth as well as exhibition spaces in Ashiya, Osaka & Kobe in Japan. Each year depending on how busy I am I usually create up to 150 canvases per year.

Outside of creating canvases for exhibitions I am constantly creating custom orders. Most custom orders I take are for family portraits or portraits of friends. The process I undertake usually consists of me doing a photoshoot of the subject then vectorising the image, printing the image out, hand cutting each layer as a stencil and finally applying each layer to canvas using spraypaint.

At any given time of the year I usually have a 5-6 month waiting list for custom orders. Below are details on a small range of exhibitions I have done. This list is updated as I complete exhibitions.

100 Bucks & Running 2 - 5000 Gallery

100 Bucks & Running 2 was the creation of local Adelaide street artist Store. Store had sent out around 50 wooden boards all painted with the same basic shape of a character running with a blank face. The artists involved in the show were to add their own flavour to the character and put a face to the image. The boards where then displayed for one night only and sold off that night for $100 each. Although I missed the opening the exhibition showcased the work of local talent such as Danica aka Nickas, Lisa King, Ruby Red Lips, Gary Seaman, and Benzo 376. For my board I decided to paint the character of Baron Samedi complete with top hat.

 

So You Think You Can Draw - Electric Light Gallery

So You Think You Can Draw was an exhibition of local artists and illustrators who had to come up with a painting of a portrait no bigger than a2 size. The exhibition showcased some amazing work from artists such as Gary Seaman, Danica aka Nickas, John Engelhardt, and Kid 9 amongst many others. The exhibition was a good example of what Adelaide talent is capable of which is just as good as the talent coming out of bigger art scenes such as Melbourne. For my piece I decided to do a smaller version of one of my paintings from my Stars & Dust exhibition which opened a week later in order to do some publicity for the show. The canvas itself was some of the smallest stencil cutting I did with some of the cuts barely 1mm in width.

 

Schaffas Group Exhibition - Urban Cow Gallery

Schaffas was an exhibition by the Screamdance guys Sam Barratt and Chris Edser who gave out mini "Schaffas" an original blank wooden toy to artists and designers from all over the world. It was then the artists responsibility to create a character out of the blank toy ready for the exhibition where it would be on display and then auctioned off for charity. The exhibition was a complete success having completely packed out the venue and raising a quite substantial amount of money for charity. For my Schaffas toy I created 2 characters out of the one toy. If you turn the toy one way it becomes Pierre the magician however if you turn the toy upside down and turn it around it becomes Pierre pet rabbit Jaques.

The character story for my toy was as follows.

Pierre The Magician / Jaques The Bunny Rabbit
Pierre is an aging magician which once worked in the smokyclubs of paris dazzling audiences with his assortment of magic tricksfrom card acts to disappearing acts but the one act which has always captured the imagination of audiences was his rabbit tricks with his white bunny Jaques. Now inseperable the pair of them journey aroundthe countryside of France showcasing the magic tricks to captivated
audiences.

 

Kustom Kulture Weekender 2008 - HWY inn

The Kustom Kulture Weekender was a Adelaide Fringe 2008 event that showcased a range of Rockabilly, Surf, Swing and Ska bands both local and interstate, Hot Rods and Kustom Kulture style artwork. Joshua was invited to be among the few artists to exhibit in the Kustom Kulture Gallery. Once invited, Joshua teamed up with local pinup model/photographer Samantha Vodic and local pinup girl/burlesque artist extraordinaire Miss Cherry Valens. Conducting a photoshoot with the two girls Joshua along with the help of Samantha Vodic conducted a 1950's style photoshoot with the models posing in front of 50's style custom hot rods. From here Joshua recreated the images to be reminiscent of images taken of the 1950's salt flat drag racing circuit from America. Both the exhibition and the work was well received with Joshua getting praise from both car enthusiasts and artists alike.

PULP! An Exploration Into The World of Detective Novels - Electric Light Cocktail Bar

Pulp! was a solo exhibition which Joshua had as part of the Adelaide Fringe 2008. Working around the theme of Detective Novels and Pulp Novels Joshua researched heavily into the artwork which adored the covers from the cheap novels from the 1930's right up into the 1960's. After taking a likeness of the imagery of the style used in the 1940's and 1950's Joshua juxtaposed these images with typography reminiscent of the clean cut styles used in the late 1950's and 1960's. Working from original concepts Joshua worked as art director for the photoshoot conducted with local models in order to capture the style of images found on the novels. From this point Joshua redrew all of these images from scratch and then finally hand cut all of these images out as stencils and spraypainted them onto canvas.

The final result was so amazing to the point that spectators at the exhibition thought that the images were of actual 1940's movie stars. The exhibition was so impressive that the Adelaide Fringe thought that the exhibition was so fantastic that it was shortlisted for the Eran Svigos Award for best Visual Arts Exhibition by An Individual at the 2008 Adelaide Fringe Awards. The exhibition managed to make it into the top 3 of over 100 exhibitions in the 2008 Adelaide Fringe.