2023 Wrap Up

As the year comes to a close I wish to thank everyone who made it an epic one. I always enjoy splashing some paint around along with the opportunity to work with great people and see familiar faces. I kept busy in 2023 and took on a variety of commissions including a 9ft kangaroo, a ceiling, beer label designs, signs, a street library, sports club, tanks, hotel, campground, airport, toilet block, a couple of aged care facilities and fourteen schools!

With my trusty K9 sidekick/supervisor Mac we completed projects all across Queensland and beyond: Aramac, Blackall, Bundamba, Burringbar, Casino, Chinchilla, Coalstoun Lakes, Coraki, Daisy Hill, Flagstone, Guluguba, Harrisville, Jericho, Lennox Head, Miles, Mulgowie, Murwillumbah, Muttaburra, Ormeau, Oxenford, Peak Crossing, Regents Park, Roma, Shailer Park, Tallebudgera, Toowong, Waterford West and Windaroo Valley.

It’s been a top year at The Sauce Studio, thanks for being along for the journey. There are also a stack of exciting projects locked in for coming months so stay tuned.

Sauce

2019 Wrap Up

I want to say thanks to all who have supported The Sauce Studio throughout the year. This year saw numerous tours Central & Western Queensland my home away from home. I also completed commissions in Cairns along with a few projects across Brisbane, Gold Coast and Tweed. As always it’s been a variety of public art commissions, youth and community projects and the odd private commission. 

It’s been great to connect with new friends and continue relationships with existing clients, some for almost 20 years now. Using my skills to pay the bills is cool but the best thing is to see people engage with art, particularly in a public setting. The friendships and travel adventures also make me genuinely humbled by your support and awesomeness. 

It hasn’t all been smooth sailing though, professionally it has tough at times witnessing both Redland City and Brisbane City remove hard earned and successful projects. These incidences highlight a disregard for councils own policies and ongoing exclusionary practices. Any incentive to do your art legitimately has long gone and I can safely say over the course of my career I have had more issues with clients breaching contracts than with any vandalism by wayward youth.

Personally I have struggled with chronic pain at times from a condition which has forced me to slow down considerably in the past few years. I will however continue painting large scale murals for as long as my health allows and as long as it remains sunny in Queensland…and it’s always sunny in Queensland!

I am looking forward to many more adventures in 2020 so after a short break I will be back splashing paint around your neighbourhood.

Sauce

Emerald

Fresh for 2016.

Sketch Swap

I'm always up for a challenge so I hit up Adelaide based aerosol artist SG1 for a sketch swap. SG1 has a unique approach to three dimensional style graffiti and its always interesting to see  your own letters from a different perspective. It took me a couple of drafts before I developed a design I was satisfied with. Maintaining form and flow without cluttering the letters was an issue for me but I enjoyed the process and props to SG1 for rocking a super Sauce sketch. More to come so stay tuned folks.  

Sauce by SG1

SG1 by Sauce

Feathered Friend

This mural is in the showcase section of our studio and everyone who walks in loves the cheeky lorikeet. Landscape and animal murals are popular with the public as the content is simple and accessible. For us in the studio, a new mural always adds some colour and reinforces our branding. If you’re looking to add some ‘WOW factor’ to your office or home a mural is a really simple choice to stand out from the crowd. 

Three Sixty Five

Three Sixty Five explores the highs and lows of an aerosol artist over a one year period. During the Wet Season of 2012/13 Sauce and Ainslie Rose spent too many days cooped up inside and spent long mornings talking over coffee about ‘what would be really cool’. It was from these heartfelt conversations the pair decided they needed to be the change and not the problem, and thus, The Sauce Studio was created. The Sauce Studio was meant to be the catalyst Murwillumbah and the Northern Rivers needed in regards to aerosol and contemporary art.

 

Still Lifeless, oil on canvas, 122cm x 91.5cm. Sauce, 2014.

Since opening last March, Sauce and Ainslie Rose have used the workshop and showcase to meet new friends and create new artworks, but it hasn’t been all beer and skittles for the creative couple. A large part of the challenge has been navigating through the bureaucracy associated with public art and murals. Sauce has worked with over eighty schools and has over a decade of professional experience, but he is still dictated to by public servants who know little if anything about public art. The bureaucracy isn’t usually site specific, that is, most large scale organizations and councils have the same level of paperwork and inane demands, however recent experiences with councils have taken the bureaucracy and flagrant stupidity to a new level.

#exhibitionthreesixtyfive, aerosol on found object. Sauce 2014.

This paper-trail full of maintenance schedules, risk management plans, design briefs, and selection criteria may be a part of everyday life for the myriad of Cultural Development Officers, but it doesn’t denote high quality art, nor extrapolate cultural innovation; except when this is used as inspiration for an exhibition. It is these experiences of tribulation and encumbrance which has fueled this creative output. This exhibition serves as a metaphor for the challenges faced by a professional aerosol artist. The Sauce Studio arose out of dissatisfaction for the hegemonic demands of traditional gallery expectations and tokenistic public art projects and this celebration one year of operations in Murwillumbah exemplifies the positivity and success.  

Retrospective Self-portrait, acrylic on canvas, 76cm x 30cm. Sauce 2014.

From the Wreck, acrylic on canvas, 183cm x 91.5cm. Sauce, 2014.

Overcast Enlightenment, oil on canvas, 70cm x 50cm. Sauce 2014.

Art Inspiration Straight From Sauce

Tweed Sun 23rd January 2014, page 2.

Studio Buddha

I began this mural in my studio in Murwillumbah nearly six months ago. I don’t normally work so slow, however I’ve travelled far and wide while Buddha patiently waited for me to finish him. The omnipotent Buddha is an image which has been replicated and celebrated all over the world, and I hope this version brings inspiration and tranquility. 

Clean Up Our Streets

The Weekend Edition of Daily News (July 20-21 2013) heralded the beginning of a campaign aimed at attacking vandals in the Tweed Shire. The Clean Up Our Streets is a Daily News initiative which shows a complete disregard for Hip Hop culture, and was poorly researched. As a professional Mural and Aerosol Artist, with over a decade of experience, Sauce is getting tired of the vilification and slander which the media constantly propagates. Below is a media release and our letter of complaint to the paper which outlines some of The Sauce Studio’s objections to this portrayal of graffiti. 

                                                                     Media Release 22/07/2013.

The weekend edition (July 20th-21st 2013) of the Daily News made scandalous claims about graffiti and vandalism in the Tweed Shire by highlighting several different ‘hot spots’ where graffiti style vandalism occurs. The article announced a new campaign called ‘Clean Up Our Streets’, however local artist Sauce, says the article is nothing more than “scaremongering and inflammatory’. 

Sauce, who has over a decade of professional mural and aerosol art experience explained how articles such as this seek to marginalize youth culture and denigrate the Hip Hop movement. “I’ve spent over a decade advocating the need for recognition of aerosol art as a legitimate art form and articles such as this do nothing except whip people into a frenzy. It doesn’t look at the real issues. This is a multi-faceted topic and ultimately, aerosol artists still don’t have places to paint and the local council doesn’t have money for public art for the next two budgets.”

Earlier this year, Sauce opened an art studio in the heart of the Murwillumbah CBD where the public can experience the different forms of aerosol art. The aim of the studio is to reinforce the positive value aerosol art and to introduce new people to the art form.   

Sauce’s work can be seen @ /

Ainslie Rose

Communications and Arts Development Manager

The Sauce Studio

Shop 4/15 CNR of Proudfoots LN & Commercial RD

Murwillumbah

02 6672 1929

Letter of Compaint                    

To Whom it May Concern,

                      Please allow my to introduce myself. My name is Ainslie and I am the Communications and Arts Development Manager at The Sauce Studio. The Sauce Studio is the workshop and retail space of professional mural artist, Sauce. Sauce has over a decade of professional experience in creating public art and murals and his work can be seen all over the East Coast of Australia.

I am writing this letter in regards to the “Clean Up Our Streets” campaign as shown in the Saturday 20th July edition of the Daily News. I would like to voice my concerns about the inflammatory language used in the article and unnecessary marginalization of aerosol art and Hip Hop culture. While I understand the need to discourage unwanted vandalism and unwanted and un-commissioned graffiti the manner in which the article suggests the issue is approached in nothing short of cheap and scandalous. As stated previously, Sauce is a professional mural artist with over a decade of experience, and in March this year we open The Sauce Studio in the heart of the Murwillumbah CBD. We felt there was a need to further inform the public about the benefits of aerosol art and hip hop culture. We also sought to stimulate the increase of professional public murals in the Tweed and Northern Rivers area as when they are executed with cultural sensitivity they can be a simple and cost effective method of graffiti prevention. 

The article in the Saturday’s edition of the Daily News is poorly researched as The Sauce Studio was not contacted for comment. Not only have we contacted this publication about the opening night, the image shown on page 7 titled ‘Under the Murwillumbah Bridge’ is less than 50 metres from the studio door. It is this lack of research which ignored the facts does not seek to portray this issue as a multi facetted subject. 

Further to this, the article does not mention the absolute lack of funding from council to assist with this issue. Both myself and Sauce have approached Tweed Shire Council to attempt the broaden their cultural awareness of this topic and enquire about the budget for public art programs. So far we have been informed there is no budget for such events for the next two years. If this article was well researched, this information would be brought to light, and the truth about public art, murals and aerosol art would be available to the public. 

I urge the Daily News to contact myself or Sauce at the Sauce Studio as it is clear there is no cultural sensitivity nor ability to research such a complex issue.

Ainslie Rose

Redefined

Some days in the Northern Rivers you just, can’t understand why there are so many closed minds and cliché groups. As a professional artist, who has moved back to the area I have really struggled to find my voice amongst the naysayers and the pretentious creative types who have taken over. I’ve spent the past decade building my professional mural business and I have nearly twenty years of experience in working with aerosols and and creating public art, but the doors of the gallery are still jammed shut. To find somewhere to create my art, I have to traipse up hills and search over the countryside to find a place to paint, when in reality there are plenty of great public places which would be perfect for a professional mural. And that doesn’t even begin to cover how the Treasures of the Tweed is devaluing my profession. Some days in the Northern Rivers, you just wonder where it all went wrong; it’s a great place to live, but a difficult place to work