Arts

Recently completed in Katoomba’s Street Art Walk as a public effort from one half of the town’s latest creative duos, fashion label FATHER SUPERIOR, visual artist CREON’s mural piece ‘Three Sisters’ (pictured above) is a vibrant celebration of modern urban culture. Its lively aesthetic is inspired by rich imagery from psychedelic rock posters of the 1960s, combined with UFOs, aliens, and sublime local landscape. 

Seeking a change of scene from Sydney to a tight-knit arts community with more space to create, FATHER SUPERIOR are now based near the cliffs of South Katoomba. In a private studio attached to their house, core artist couple CREON and Jodee Knowles discussed and planned the large-scale work from early August this year. It now beautifies a controversial main wall in the walk which was formerly vandalised due to related criminal allegations. As well as being his first feature wall as a public solo artist, the new, improvised piece is CREON’s largest independent mural to date. He is currently seeking further opportunities for creating similar pieces.

Earlier in his career, CREON provided live painting work at events of the Foo Fighters, Commonwealth Bank, and Canadian DJ/producer Deadmau5. When FATHER SUPERIOR were established in Sydney, the duo collaborated on a few street art pieces in the style of Knowles, who also painted a mural at Disneyland in Los Angeles. Following on from a recent piece at Mountain Culture Beer Co in Katoomba, she has now finished the background and installation of two new works in Froma Lane, off Katoomba St. They gorgeously compliment some other fresh works from more local female artists and some beautiful bird murals from Scott Nagy, which are also displayed in the lane. At her first solo show in Los Angeles, Knowles met and sold artworks to American pop star P!nk. She also lived with The Cure’s keyboardist Roger O’Donnell, in London. Knowles is now preparing for a solo exhibition of paintings at Studio 281, which will be shown from October 23rd to November 8th in her hometown of Perth, Western Australia.

Together as their label, the current creative approach of FATHER SUPERIOR has now been honed through CREON and Knowles’ joint resumes of notable clients, customers, and endorsements, including clients such as Vans and Volcom. As FATHER SUPERIOR, CREON and Knowles have now worked with the likes of Hewlett-Packard and Young Henrys, though they strive to maintain a community focus through collaborations with the Mountains Youth Services Team (MYST), the Katoomba branch of Blackheath Community Op Shop (BCOS) and Willem Hendriksen’s events and media agency, Retro Rehash Presents.

Although notable for their individual practices, FATHER SUPERIOR are mainly concerned with creating ‘up-cycled’ fashion as wearable works of art - which are available on their website: https://fathersuperior.com/

Picture: CREON in front of some of his older works, photo credit to Alex Weltlinger. Mural picture courtesy of the artist.