2022 Artist-in-Residence recipients announced

 
Craft ACT: Craft + Design Centre is delighted to announce that Craft ACT Accredited Professional Members, Bev Hogg and Julie Ryder and General Member, Mel Robson have been selected as the 2022 Craft ACT Artists-in-Residence. This is a highly competitive program where all applications undergo a rigorous review process by a panel made up of representatives from the Program Partners (National Library of Australia and ACT Parks and Conservation), Craft ACT management and Craft ACT Accredited Professional Members from different craft and design mediums.

This year saw a high standard of applications from Australian artists across the nation from diverse practices and career levels. The selection panel were impressed by the high standard of applications.

Craft ACT and ACT Parks & Conservation Service have presented this acclaimed program since 2006. Artists have found, time and again, that their practice is profoundly altered by the experience of this residency which allows precious stillness and space for investigation, reflection and generation of new work.

In 2022, Craft ACT is honoured to collaborate with the National Library of Australia as our research partner. Artists-in-residence will undertake research on the National Library’s extraordinary map collection. The National Library’s map collection contains over 1 million maps, including maps from early European charts to current mapping of Australia.

Senior Craft ACT APM and ceramist, Bev Hogg will be using the research period for, “investigating the informal and unconventional maps held within the collection. Of specific interest will be mud maps, historic maps or mappings of animals or birds focusing on the Namagdi area, interactive maps and maps composed of other mixed media”.

Hogg's work has won several major awards including the Canberra Circle Visual Arts Award, The National Ceramic Award and the Doug Alexander Memorial Award, and is included in public collections such as Parliament House, Artbank, Goulburn Regional Art Gallery, Canberra Museum and Gallery and the ACT Legislative Assembly.

Canberra-based textiles designer with national and international recognition, Julie Ryder plans to research and develop ideas for a new body of work that revolves around the theme of human absence and presence within the natural and constructed landscape.

Her hybrid practice combines her knowledge of science with her love of textiles, and she uses nature as both muse and co-collaborator. Natural materials are used for dyes and as materials for paper-based artworks.

Alice Springs based ceramist, Mel Robson will be using the research period for, “exploring the idea of territory – as a geographic, political and personal concept, and the intersections of these as a means of investigating and representing the many layered and complex ideas around place – land use, ownership, dispossession, stewardship, memory and personal connection.”

For over 20 years, Mel has been creating functional objects, sculptural works, installation pieces and public art. Her exhibition practice centres around ideas of place and identity and the ways in which histories, stories and associations can become embedded in everyday objects. Mel’s work is held in national and international collections and is regularly featured in art and design publications.

The research period will be followed by a three-week residency period at Namadgi National Park, where Bev, Julie and Mel will share a living and working space at Gudgenby Ready-Cut Cottage.

During her time at Ready-Cut Cottage, Bev hopes to “identify and map animals and birds as they go about their daily habits and routines and create a deeper understanding of the importance of place, identity and land to their survival.” Julie is looking forward to the opportunity to interpret the immediate and surrounding landscape with its seasonal variations, as well as an opportunity to absorb the legacy left by the previous inhabitants. Mel’s aim is to, “create works that respond both to the residency site but also to universal ideas around territory.”

In 2023 Bev, Julie and Mel will present the outcomes of their research and residency with new bodies of work displayed in the annual Artist-in-Residence exhibition at the Craft ACT gallery.

Craft ACT would like to congratulate all the recipients and thank all artists who applied.

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Bev Hogg, Wear Nuts - Euc. Erythrocorys, Marri & Banksia, 2019, clay & engobes, 73h cm. Photo: Brenton McGeachie.

Julie Ryder, Mapping, 2014, naturally dyed ands stitched fabrics. Photo: Courtesy of the artist.

Mel Robson, Pastoral Series, 2019, Wheel thrown porcelain with decals, 17cm x 7cm x 7cm. Photo: Courtesy of the artist.