Josh first showed his work in a cafe – now, DiCaprio and Stiller are among his fans

Glamorous women and dapper dudes lounge around in exotic locales, at hip parties, in retro clubs, or in drop-dead-cool, mid-century design pads, often accompanied by cats, tikis and cocktails. Welcome to the cool, stylised world of Shag, the US artist whose moniker is a portmanteau of his real name, Josh Agle. Along with his wife and two university-age kids, Agle, 62, divides his time between a house in Southern California “with a lot of glass and timber and green-shag carpet I put in the sunken living room” and a “tropical, tiki-vibe” home in Palm Springs, where he also has a gallery and boutique.

“The major visual inspirations for my art are anonymous illustrators and graphic designers from the ’50s and ’60s,” says Agle. “But the thematic inspirations are European artists from the late 1800s and early 1900s who were making paintings based on their interests and social life. I think of Renoir painting cafes and dance halls or Picasso painting bullfights in the same way I think of myself painting people enjoying a Mai Tai in a tiki bar.”

Starting out as a musician, commercial artist and graphic designer, he rose to fame after selling out a series of paintings he did for an exhibition in a Santa Monica coffee shop in 1995. Today, his art is highly sought-after and collected by the likes of Leonardo DiCaprio, Whoopi Goldberg, Ben Stiller and Nancy Sinatra.

“I’ve never really been interested in who was collecting my work, so the galleries that sell my art often don’t tell me that a celebrity bought something,” he says. “And then I find out about it another way. Someone will send me a link to a YouTube video of a celebrity’s house, or someone will tell me they went to a party at a movie star’s home and they own some of my work. I was at a Hollywood party and the host was introducing me as Shag to some famous people, and most of them said the same thing: ‘The Shag?’ Which of course, was very flattering.”

Outside the US, Australia is his biggest market, thanks mainly to Melbourne’s Outré Gallery, which has championed his work for almost three decades. In June, Outré presents Lush Life: Recent and Rare Prints by Shag, in Melbourne and Sydney. The artist has created 200 signed, limited-edition serigraph prints called The Lyre Bird for the occasion ($950 unframed; from $1850 framed), featuring Australian flora and fauna and a cheeky reference to Sidney Nolan.

“The landscape and animals of Australia are very distinctive, but I had to be wary of not making it look like an image one might see on a souvenir tea towel,” he says. “I looked to Australian landscape painters of the early 20th century for inspiration and researched the range of the animals in the print to make sure that such a scene could exist somewhere in Australia.

“I had never heard of a lyrebird until I visited Healesville Sanctuary outside Melbourne a few years ago. I just knew that bird had to be the star of the picture when I decided to make it.”

Lush Life: Recent and Rare Prints by Shag is at Outré Gallery, Melbourne, June 20-July 13; Outré Pop-Up, Sydney, June 27-29.

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