READY FOR a smashing night of fun at You Can’t Stop the Music? WE SURE ARE!
We spoke to Joe Filocamo, the talented artist behind the creation of the wonderful caricatures depicting the stars of the show, Chris and Courtney Murphy, Clay Darius and Paula Parore. See his interview with Platinum below...
So, who is Joe?
Joseph Filocamo is a local freelance artist who specialises in a unique surrealist depiction of a variety of characters, creatures and real-life people. Not only does Joe continually dedicate himself to his art, he is also a hard-working engineer!
We had the pleasure of talking to Joseph about his art, inspirations and life as an artist in Perth. Here's what he said about how he started making art and why he continues to do so.
“Like most people, I was sat at a table during my young school years to take part in regular art class. At some point along the way, a lot of people just stop for some reason, I just never did,” Joe said.
He also recalls a strong childhood memory associated with art, he recalls receiving positive feedback from someone in regard to his stick figure interpretation of his family inside a house. Realising he made an impact on someone with his art has stuck with him all this time on. This realisation is a main reason why Joseph continues his art, as well as his love for art’s ability to communicate “meta-truth” and tap into a shared subconscious.
Finding Inspiration
When Joe is hunting for inspiration, he usually turns to philosophy, music and stories. Although, “it's often fleeting moments of clarity or observations that strike hard that I usually have to immediately commit to my sketchbook.” Joe loves to capture these fleeting moments through the creation of caricatures.
When asked what it’s like being a local Perth artist, Joe said he's proud that the Perth scene is strong.
"We have a lot of super talented experts in various fields, but we also have a lot of multidiscipline artists that tie audio to visual to mechanical engineering to drama and everything in between which is super exciting!”
Joe loves to encourage artistic activity by hosting a fortnightly social drawing club called “Drink and Draw” which has been running for 8 years and helps promote artistic discovery for all skill levels and backgrounds. We definitely recommend checking it out if you have any interest in art and would love to mingle with like-minded folk in a very supportive environment!
Joe Loves
Joe also told us about his favourite local artists. Although he says there are many many talented people and he has many many favourites, he told us about two;
“Jenna Downing is a multidisciplined artist/mechatronic engineer/life hacker who is also a close friend. I am an engineer myself and so we quite often overlap on projects we attack and have lots of insights to share.
"John Holdcroft. Brilliant illustrator who you may know as "the guy who does weekly the chalk drawings instructing people to "stand to smoke, sit to drink" at the Flying Scotsman. His ability to generate funny and topical illustrations week after week blows me away!”
Let's work together.
Lastly, Joe let us know that we can support our local Perth artists by looking for smaller galleries/bars/cafes and various other local spaces where they have shows and exhibitions all the time. These smaller shows are a great way for an emerging artist to showcase their work and give themselves some exposure and validation after working so hard on their pieces.
Want to see more of Joe's work? Find him on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/JoeFilocamoArt/
Tickets for You Can’t Stop the Music are available right now from Ticketek.
Read more about the show here >