2022 Fellow: Pippa Mott
Pippa Mott is a curator, cultural producer & arts writer based in lenapehoking/Brooklyn. Over the course of an eight-year career with the curatorial team at Mona (the Museum of Old and New Art), Pippa (she/her) has curated and produced a range of museum exhibitions, festival projects, commissioned artworks, and public programs. With an academic background in archaeology and prior experience in public programming and science communication, she has a unique vantage point on material culture and visitor experience. With the support of the American Australian Association/American Friends of the National Gallery of Australia AusArt Scholarship and the Fulbright Tasmania Postgraduate Scholarship, Pippa is completing an MA in the History of Art & Archaeology at the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University. Through the Marica and Jan Vilcek Curatorial Program and the Metropolitan Museum of Art Curatorial Practice Program, Pippa is exploring the ethical and socio-political dimensions of curatorship. Whilst in New York, Pippa continues to work with Mona as Associate Curator and regularly contributes to Artist Profile as International Writer.
2021 Fellow: Guy Grabowsky
ARTIST BIO Guy Grabowsky is a Melbourne-based artist working with analogue photography. Grabowsky creates photographs with and without the camera.
Grabowsky graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Honours) from the VCA, (University of Melbourne) in 2018. He will commence an MFA in Photography at Parsons School of Design, The New School, NYC to develop his practice by examining psychological and perceptual relationships to a ‘post-photographic’ and ‘hypernormalised’ world: how it is continually evolving, with an evidently shifting reality, and our perception of it.
Selected exhibitions include, Ten Year Show, STATION, Melbourne (2021); Earth Rots Underfoot, COMA, Sydney (2021); neither here nor there, Sutton Projects, PHOTO 2021, Melbourne (2021); Deep Breakfast, Hayden’s, Melbourne (2020); Symbionts, STATION, PHOTO 2021, Melbourne (2020); Glass Eye, Lon Gallery, Melbourne (2019); 1805, Alpine Central, Mount Buller (2019). Other galleries include Monash Gallery of Art, Melbourne (2019); Centre of Contemporary Photography, Melbourne (2019); Margaret Lawrence Gallery, Melbourne (2019); George Paton Gallery, Melbourne (2019).
Guy deferred his Fellowship due to the COVID pandemic and commenced his MFA at Parsons in August 2022.
Image credit: Hugh Davies
2020 Fellow: Kai Wasikowski
Kai Wasikowski is a multidisciplinary artist living and working on Gadigal land. Kai's practice utilises photography, readymade materials and multimedia to address feelings of anxiety and dissonance brought upon by rapid environmental and technological change. Kai’s process and research draws upon photography, environmentalist histories and speculative narratives, as well as experiences from his formative childhood years.
Kai completed a Bachelor of Visual Arts (First Class Honours with University Medal) at the Sydney College of the Arts (SCA), University of Sydney in 2016. Kai's graduate work was recognised through awards such as the University Medal, the SCA Dean’s Honours Award, the Artereal Gallery Mentorship Award and the Dr. Harold Schenberg Art Fellowship. In 2019 Kai undertook a two-month residency at the Three Shadows Photography Art Centre in Beijing and Xiamen.
Recently Kai was awarded a full tuition scholarship to undertake a Masters of Fine Art at the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD). Kai also received the American Australian Association’s AusArt Scholarship to assist with his studies. Kai will begin his graduate degree at RISD September 2021.
Photograph © Joe Brennan, courtesy of Kai Wasikowski.
2019 fellow: nicholas smith
Nicholas Smith is a visual artist from Melbourne, Australia. In September, he will be commencing an MFA in Art at ArtCenter College of Design, Pasadena. In his planned creative work and thesis, Nicholas will explore how occupying dominant Catholic and English/Western modalities can offer avenues for cultural critique and self-expression in order to rupture constructed mythologies of class, sexuality and colonial heritage. His research will inform his use of ceramics, textiles and installation as sculptural mediums.
Nicholas’ recent solo exhibitions include: Swaddle me, West Space (Melbourne), Feint understanding, Tcb Art Inc. (Melbourne), Cooled pride, roused ardour, Bus Projects (Melbourne) and I am crying, Firstdraft (Sydney). He has participated in the Mildura Biennale, Hobiennale, and Recess, an online video art platform. He has recently held residencies at Frontyard Projects Inc. (Sydney), and NextWave’s Brunswick Mechanics Institute (Melbourne). His work is held in the National Gallery of Victoria’s public art collection.
2018 Fellow: Caroline Garcia
The New School / Parsons School of Design, New York
Area of Study: Video and Performance
Caroline Garcia is an interdisciplinary artist, working across live performance and video art. She has exhibited and performed widely in Australia and internationally. Her recent projects include Performance x 4A, Art Central, Hong Kong; Night Mass, DARK MOFO, Hobart, Tasmania; Next Wave Festival, Melbourne; OPENCITY2018, Manila Biennale, Manila, Philippines.
In the Fine Arts program, Garcia will be expanding on her art practice and her research regarding diasporic politics, dance and performance histories using popular culture and colonial imagery. In addition, she will continue exploring the representation of peripheral bodies in mainstream media, forgotten choreographies, liminal spaces and the ethnographic image.
Photograph © Alex Wisser, courtesy of Parramatta Artist Studios.
2017 Fellow: Nicholas Croggon
Columbia University, Department of Art History & Archaeology
Area of study: post-war European and American art
Nicholas Croggon is an art historian and critic, and is currently completing his PhD in art history at Columbia University, New York, focusing on the intersection of film, video and avant-garde art in the 1970s.
Nicholas is the co-founder and co-editor of the Australian contemporary art journal Discipline, the editor of the online art history journal, emaj and has written widely on contemporary Australian art.
Nicholas graduated with first class honours in Art History and Law from the University of Melbourne, and before commencing his PhD worked for four years as a lawyer: first at commercial firm DLA Piper and then at the public interest environmental law office, Environmental Justice Australia.
2016 Fellow: Mark Hilton
International Studio and Curatorial Program (ISCP), New York
Area of study: Sculpture, Painting and Drawing
Mark Hilton is a contemporary artist and is currently part of the Ground Floor residency at the International Studio & Curatorial Program (ISCP) in Brooklyn, New York. Hilton’s practice is driven by a fascination with the passage between the impossible and the inevitable.
Hilton has exhibited widely, including Darren Knight Gallery, Sydney; National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne; Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney; Australian Centre of Contemporary Art, Melbourne; Canberra Contemporary Art Spaces, Canberra; Galerie Petronas, Kuala Lumpur; The Ian Potter Museum of Art, Melbourne and Careof, Milano. He has undertaken several residencies, including at Viafarini Galerie, Milano, Gertrude Contemporary, Melbourne and CoLab Projects, Texas.
Photograph © Ece Gürleyik, courtesy of Mark Hilton.
2014 Fellow: Aaron Cooper
The New School / Parsons School of Design, New York
Area of study: Sculpture, Installation and Photography
Aaron Cooper is a contemporary artist who undertook a Masters of Fine Art at Parsons, The New School for Design in New York. Working across sculpture, installation and photography. His practice investigates social, spatial and urban conditions from intersections of art and architecture. He has received recognition from the Australia Council for the Arts, Bill Perrin Sculpture Foundry Prize, Ironside Studios Award and Victoria Harbour Young Artists Initiative.
2013 Fellow: Jessie English
The New School / Parsons School of Design
Area of study: Photography
Jessie English is a photographer whose practice manipulates photography to investigate power structures, gender, and the nature of public and private memory. She has exhibited her photomedia and installation works in Sydney, Berlin, Malmo, New York, and London. Jessie holds an undergraduate degree in Visual Arts from Sydney College of the Arts.
Image courtesy of Jessie English.
2012 Fellow: Caitlin Breare
New York University, New York
Area of study: Conservation
Caitlin Breare pursued her Masters of Conservation at the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University. Her study involved using technical analyses, in combination with historical research to help understand materials and techniques of artists and inform treatment decisions for artworks, as well as practical training in various treatment methods. Her specific interests include the parallels between 19th century American and Australian painters’ techniques, and the relation between visual perception and conservation theory/practice.