There’s not much Gabriel Cole can’t do. He’s a deft hand with a paintbrush, designs streetwear, is a machine on the athletics field and can run 100 metres in under 10.92 seconds.

“I can’t really write or paint with my left arm,” he offers. But his right arm takes care of that anyway.

Cole was born with a shortened arm and a webbed hand that has two fingers. At the age of five he had an operation to separate those two fingers to give him improved functionality. He started running seriously at 15 and painting at 17.

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Now his art can be seen on walls across Adelaide. He and mate Lucas Croall collaborated on the bright interior at Africola and the exterior of The Wheatsheaf Hotel. The pair also created streetwear clothing label Beyond Killa, inspired by Matisse and Joan Miró. Their handiwork can be purchased at Adelaide’s Created Range in Rundle Mall and online.

But his focus is on running this month. His first event in the Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro is on September 10. It’s a big deal for the kid from Adelaide. “You’ll always get nervous, the main thing is to accept that,” he says. “Once I get to the Olympic village I’ll be in a competition mindset.”

Years of training went into preparation, but he also has that childhood determination to draw upon.

“I learnt to ride my bike and learnt to grip things the way I do,” he says. “It is what it is. If it’s with you from birth you just learn to go through life like that. Disabilities are different when they are acquired. When someone has something happen to them; for example they’ve had their leg cut off, their whole world changes. Depression can be a problem.”

Even so, the disability knocked his confidence. “I guess when you’re young it’s easy to cry and get really upset about things,” he says. “That definitely happened. When you’re young and getting hassled you just want to be like everyone else.”

Sport changed things. First soccer, then sprinting.

“I made sure I wasn’t going to miss out on anything,” he says. “I decided I was going to be better than people at most things. It was like a little challenge to myself.”

At 15, he was approached by a talent scout who convinced him to take things up a notch and train as a runner. He started competing in 2009 and by 2010 represented Australia at the National Championships and 2010 Commonwealth Games, then took up a an athletics scholarship with the South Australian Institute of Sport. He went on to compete in the 2012 Australian and German National Championships, the 2012 Summer Paralympics in London, won silver at the 2013 IPC Athletics World Championship in Lyon, France, and finished fifth in the 2015 IPC Athletics World Championships in Doha.

Cole recently settled in Melbourne when his coach, Stephen Butler, made the move for work. He trains at Albert Park and Aberfeldie Park athletics track. When he’s not training he can usually be found at the Carlton North art studio he shares with artists Tristan Kerr and Lachlan Phillip. They call it the Bermuda Triangle Solution.

The new creative chapter is challenging. “At this stage, being an artist in Melbourne is a lot more difficult than being an artist in Adelaide,” he says. “The cost of rent is a lot higher. When you move to a big city where you’re not well known it’s like starting fresh again. You’re not so much a big fish in a small pond, you’re a small fish in a big pond.”

He looks around his studio, a short trip from his share house at the top of the building. “I have so much respect for how hard it is to make paintings. It takes a long time to master it and it isn’t something you can be naive about.”

Lately, his work has moved towards abstraction. “Some days I want to make nice paintings and other days I want to make really violent, dark ones,” he says. “Some have a real ’80s aesthetic going on. I don’t think I’ve really found my set style yet. Or maybe that’s just the way I work.”

When Rio is done and dusted, he’s ready to give it his best shot.

“Running gave me confidence to explore things I was into. Then I did a full 180 and started trying to do everything I wanted,” he says. “Art was never encouraged. It wasn’t something my parents were interested in and it’s only now they’re starting to get their head around it.”

Update: Cole has qualified for the Men's 100m T45/46/47 final at the Paralympic Games in Rio. The event will be broadcasted on Seven on Monday 12 September at 12.45pm EST (September 11, 11.45pm BRT).

From November 17 to December 10, Cole is part of a group exhibition curated by James Bowen at Fort Delta art gallery in Melbourne.

gabrielcole.com.au