Cover Artist: Mulga

Sydney-based illustrator, poet, and muralist Joel ‘Mulga’ Moore has been covering the world with bright and bold characters for years. His latest creation, MulgaKongz, has entered a new digital platform. Beaches COVERED. Publisher, John Vickery, spoke with this season’s Cover Artist to fi nd out more.

G’day Joel. I did a little Google research and discovered the name Mulga is reference to a hardy Australian Native plant found throughout inland Australia. Why the name Mulga? How does it suit your personality? Mulga was my nickname at school and I got it when I was in year 5. I recited Banjo Patterson’s poem ‘Mulga Bill’s Bicycle’ in front of my class. I heard one of my snot-nosed classmates, who sat next to me saying, “Hey it’s Mulgaaaa.” The name stuck. Some variations have been Mulga Bill, Mulga Pig and Mulgs.

When it came to choosing an artist name, I googled my real name. There is an American actor dude with the same name as me. He even has the same middle name as me, which is kinda freaky. You might recognise him from the movies – Dodgeball and Avatar.

I think Mulga works well and it ties in nicely with how my art has an Australian larrikin feel and the fact that my nickname comes from a character in a poem. I now write poems about my own artistic creations so it’s a nice full circle kind of thing.

If the plants are Aussie and hardy, as an artist how would you describe yourself, style, persona, wit? I’d describe my artistic style as Summer fun-loving Aussie good times; lots of bright colours and funky characters chilling. I like to make people smile so with my art, I’m always trying to bring joy, colour and fun times into the world. The world is full of serious bad stuff at the moment so I like to make my mark by creating a world where only good times exist, and the viewer can enter it for a brief moment of time and feel good.

Your style is defi nitely unique and colourful. Is this the inner kid trying to break-out in you or do you just wish to make a statement with colour? I don’t want to grow up so there’s defi nitely that element of the child within breaking out

in my creations. Creating in bright, funky colours is something that came natural to me. I fi gured if you are going to use colours, it’s better to use bright, nice ones than dull, daggy ones.

Reinvention. You once worked in fi nance. You’re now a successful international artist. Talk me through how you made that transition. After I left school, I went to uni and got a Bachelor of Economics. I found myself working in the fi nancial planning industry. After 10 years, I came to my senses and thought of trying my hand at fulfi lling my lifelong desire of having a career I actually liked. Art was something I loved so I started my new career in art by printing my artwork onto T-shirts and taking them to markets on the weekends. For about two years, I did this while still working in an offi ce job. My art career then just took off. That was eight years ago and it’s been an awesome ride.

I’ve heard you are getting into the NFT world. What are NFTs and how have they made monetising art in the new world a lot easier and profi table? Non-Fungible Token (NFT) is a digital asset that exists completely in the digital universe—you can’t touch

@mulgatheartist - Mulga Bro Kong Curl that mo, we’re coming out strong, down at the beach with them MulgaKongz

it, but you can own it. An NFT can be any type of digital fi le – an artwork, an article, music or even a meme. The way, it can be owned through technology called the blockchain which makes ownership of digital assets possible. Before blockchain technology, digital assets could not be owned, so it’s a pretty huge development.

Now you can purchase, own and trade unique digital artworks like you can a real life original painting.

I’m releasing a collection of artworks called MulgaKongz. There will be 8,888 unique gorilla artworks sitting on the Ethereum blockchain. If you purchase one, you will be a shareholder in the MulgaKongz world, join the community and participate in the benefi ts it provides. Over time, that digital asset could increase in value (not fi nancial advice).

It’s still early days for NFTs and 99% of people don’t know what they are, but I think it’s worth being educated on it and getting your head around it too.

If you are interested in checking out my MulgaKongz project, go to my Twitter account at @MulgaKongzNFT or visit www.mulgakongz.com. Your characters in your artwork, such as the MulgaKongz NFT series, will be throughout this issue of Beaches COVERED. Why are the characters cool to draw? How did you come up with the concept? I fi rst started drawing gorillas in 2012 after taking my daughter to Taronga Zoo. There was this big, awesome gorilla just hanging out there. He inspired me. I’ve painted a lot of murals, but my fi rst ever mural was of a gorilla at Bondi Beach. Releasing an NFT collection of Summer-loving gorillas is a natural progression. I really do love drawing them. Funky humanifi ed animals is my favourite subject matter.

Growing up as a kid, was the height of Mambo Art with legends such as Reg Mombassa an inspiration to you? Reg Mombassa and his awesome collab work with Mambo was defi nitely an inspiration to me. I sketched a few farting dog drawings in the margins of my textbooks in my school days.

What’s the biggest piece of wall space you have ever worked on? I’ve painted a couple of big colourful gorilla characters on some large walls at Greenway Plaza Shopping Centre in Western Sydney. The biggest wall was about 30 metres by 8 metres. I’ve also been part of a project in China where my artwork was animated and lit up on about 15 high-rise buildings using millions of LED lights. That was pretty sweet!

Beaches COVERED.’s Autumn issue theme is CULTURE. Do you think the Australian art scene and culture is in a strong place for 2022? I know a lot of the creative industry have been doing it tough these past few years during COVID and the lockdowns. But taking COVID out of the equation, I think we are in a good place. As an artist, there are a lot of opportunities, whether that be public art projects, licensing art on cool products for cool brands or to the emergence of the NFT world. There are opportunities out there. It’s just a matter of fi nding them and getting involved. •

MULGA THE ARTIST MULGA@MULGATHEARTIST.COM.AU INSTA @MULGATHEARTIST www.mulgatheartist.com.au