No two jobs are the same for artist Daniel Joyce.
One minute he's airbrush-painting a beachside mural, the next he's pencil-drawing a family portrait and then he finds himself painting a giant pair of ugg boots.
The five-metre tall boots are outside Mortels Sheepskin Factory at Thornton in the NSW Hunter region.
"They're actually cyclone-proof. They were installed just before a big storm several years ago. They wobbled a bit but lasted the cyclonic-type wind," Daniel said.
"They're a fibreglass shell with a wire-mesh frame. I looked inside and they're hollow."
The artwork is about "how Mother Nature has the final say".
"Final Say is what [business owner] Stephanie Mortel liked as the title for the piece," Daniel said.
It's about climate change and the Australian life of fire and flood.
The art features elements of the Maitland floods, drought, bushfire, a storm and tsunami.
Before he created the artwork, Daniel stood on a main angle from the highway and visualised a "giant wave on one side, where people can stand up against it, like they're inside the wave".
"Mortels is Australian through and through - it's good to get behind that," the Newcastle artist said.
We put it to Daniel that there could be a market for this kind of artwork on real ugg boots.
"Funny you say that. Years ago I used to custom paint ugg boots in their shop for customers," he said.
"I'd paint skulls and dreamcatchers and all kinds. I even painted portraits on ugg boots. People were spending $200 on ugg boots, then doubling it on a custom-painted pair.
"I'd put a sealer over the boots, like a Scotchgard, then fine airbrush it. It was totally paintable."
