Adelaide has many perks and bountiful local booze is one of them. For artist Kerri Wright, living in Adelaide brings about the unique opportunity to wrap her art around bottles of Adelaide's finest.

Adelaide is a city that values good, locally produced wine, beer and spirits. Obviously. No argument – we’re a proud bunch.

And, because of our burgeoning booze industry, a space has been created for our local artists to showcase their work, that space being wine, beer and spirit labels.

One Adelaide artist, Kerri Wright, has found herself an unexpected niche for her delicate and dark print work.

Her art is recognisable – readers have very likely seen her work around the city, be it on a wall, a t-shirt, or perhaps most noticeably: in a bar, glued to a bottle of wine or gin.

Last year, Alpha Box & Dice launched Lazarus, and along with it, Kerri’s label design.

“I was approached to do the Lazarus label and they had me in mind from the very beginning. I think the wine took at least 5 years in the barrel to be ready,” says Kerri.

“The whole story behind the Lazarus wine is that it’s old wine poured into new wine, it’s a bit of a witches’ brew and they’ve wanted me to do the label since the get go.”

When the time came, the fit was right.

“Alpha Box and I, we’re like best buddies… [They’re] one of those clients that just the vibes have been there the whole time, it just all flowed really easily… Pretty much the first design I did they were like yes.” says Kerri.

“This,” Kerri says, as she shows us the supple leather label in her hands, “is the first test print that we did. It’s a wood cut.”

“It’s just one of those things where they’ve always got my back; with the chalk boards I did for them at King’s Head, they were like ‘hey, are you free?’ It was a last minute thing. And I had no designs in mind for them. It’s just one of those dream clients where everything just melds perfectly.”

Since doing the Lazarus label, Kerri says that the on-flow of opportunity and recognition has been incredible, with the merch made for that label often walking the streets of Adelaide.

More recently, Kerri was commissioned by Never Never Distillery to do a print that was to feature on their Triple Juniper Gin.

The label for Never Never’s first release – the Triple Juniper Gin. This photo: Sam Roberts

“The Never Never Distillery was a challenge in a good way… stepping out of my comfort zone in terms of style. It was really specific, and they hired me for my printing skill rather than anything else. So having to take that on board, it took a lot of time, a lot of different designs, lots of different cuts of lino and sketches,” she says.

And the opportunity brought forth the experience of working closely with designers

“Working with Carlo Jensen… he really brought it up to another level. He gave it a very design feel,” Kerri says.

The relationship between artist and business does not always elicit a vision of harmony, or indeed happiness for said artist, but it seems there is something about local collaborations in Adelaide that erases that stigma.

“Working with business as an artist is challenging,” Kerri says.

“It’s quite a niche style that I do and it’s quite recognisable, people tend to know my work as soon as they see it. And I guess working with businesses… it’s quite hard to find that happy spot, stepping outside of my art and doing it for someone else. But, at the same time, the clients are a lot of the time from Adelaide, and they work with me because they like my style.”

Kerri recently moved back to Adelaide after spending two and a half years studying graphic design in Sydney.

“In Sydney it was great and there were cool opportunities to work, but my heart and soul was wanting to come back,” She says.

“I love working in Adelaide. It’s my home town. I have such an irresponsible pride for it.

“It has been a bit of a tough road getting work. There’s only so many designers and design studios that are working here, and so only so many people who have work for you. It’s hard. But it’s rewarding when you do get that work.

“Seeing all the peeps in Adelaide wandering around with my designs on them, it’s just nice to see… it’s not like they’re directly supporting you, but it’s nice to see people in Adelaide buying t-shirts and stuff.”

Next on the agenda, Kerri wants to tackle a whiskey label.

“That’d be sick,” she says, “to just build up the repertoire of booze labels. It just works really well with my style.”

But to do that, more people need to stay here and set up businesses of their own, she says.

“I just want everyone to stay. Stay and do what you want to do and make it work here. It’s going to be hard to crack, but it’s worth it. It’s a heaps good city.”

A city made all the heaps gooder when art and booze combine.