Lawyer turned street artist Kaff-eine has painted public walls around the world, while pursuing watercolour realism in her Melbourne studio. Combining creativity with a strong social conscience, she produces art and film projects with a variety of communities, inviting audiences to engage with social and political issues. Her filmmaking is collaborative, striking and raw; while her studio and street painting practice is loaded with stylised symbolism and narrative.
Kaff-eine’s international creative collective has produced four exhibitions and two documentaries, including the award-winning feature film Happyland, which follows Kaff-eine’s unique art-as-housing project in the Philippines’ dumpsite slums. She was the first female Australian artist to paint for Victoria’s Silo Art Trail, and the first Australian artist to create a pyrotechnic sculpture for Mexico’s international fireworks festival. She also painted Australia’s first public sistergirl mural (transgender Tiwi Islander) in Darwin.
Kaff-eine takes special interest in creating collaborative artworks. These include Infinite Thanks; a traveling participatory exhibition about LGBTQIA+ gratitude, honouring rainbow deities and sharing LGBTQIA+ stories of thankfulness, Southern Wild; a portrait exhibition where nude non-professional models directed their own sittings, and many more murals painted in collaboration with communities from remote Arnhemland islands, isolated outback towns and teeming international cities.
