About

Katie West is an artist and Yindjibarndi woman based in Noongar Ballardong country, working in installation, textiles and social practice. The process and notion of naturally dyeing fabric underpin her practice – the rhythm of walking, gathering, bundling, boiling up water and infusing materials with plant matter. Using found and naturally dyed textiles, video, and sound, Katie creates installations, textile pieces, and happenings that invite attention to the ways we weave our stories, places, histories, and futures.

Katie studied visual art at Edith Cowan University (2009) and Sociology at Murdoch University (2013). In 2017 Katie completed a Master of Contemporary Art at the Victorian College of the Arts, University of Melbourne, graduating as the recipient of the Dominik Mersch Gallery Award and the Falls Creek Resort Indigenous Award.

Katie also shares a collaborative project with artist and writer Fayen d’Evie entitled Museum Incognita. Sparked by asking what forms a decolonised museum may take, Museum Incognita revisits neglected, concealed, or obscured histories, activates embodied readings, and archives ephemeral artworks and practices. Founded on a custodial ethic, the infrastructure enfolds performative encounters and a nomadic sculptural architecture, with gathering vessels, botanical furnishings, auditory texts, and tactile mnemonics for oral storytelling.

Exhibitions and residencies for the Museum Incognita project include: When the other meets the other, curated by Biljana Ciric, Cultural Centre of Belgrade, Serbia; Summer Residency: Museum Incognita, Blindside, Melbourne VIC; A thousand times the rolling sun, curated by Gabriel Curtin, HM Prison, Beechworth, VIC; and the University of Melbourne’s Department of Geography Artist in Residence Program.


katiewestprojects@gmail.com


Instagram: @katiewularni


Education

2017 Master of Contemporary Art, Victorian College of the Arts, University of Melbourne

2013 Bachelor of Art (Sociology), Murdoch University

2009 Bachelor of Art (Visual Art), Edith Cowan University


Awards

Dominik Mersch Gallery Award, Victorian College of the Arts & Dominik Mersch Gallery, 2017

Falls Creek Resort Indigenous Art Award, Victorian College of the Arts & Falls Creek Resort, 2017

Kickstart, Next Wave Festival, 2015


Collections

Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece

Central TAFE Art Collection, Perth, Australia

Print Council of Australia, Melbourne, Australia


Solo Exhibitions

2019

wilayi bangarrii, wanyaarri (go for a walk, listen), Dominik Mersch Gallery, Sydney NSW

Clearing, TarraWarra Museum of Art, Healesville VIC

2018

Warna (ground), Caves Gallery, Melbourne VIC

Muhlu Garwarrn / cool time hot time, Dominik Mersch Gallery, Sydney NSW

2016

Decolonist, Perth Centre for Photography, Perth WA

Decolonist, West Space, Next Wave Festival 2016, Melbourne VIC


Group Exhibitions

2021

Temporal Artefacts, Benalla Art Gallery, Benalla VIC

A Biography of Daphne, Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, Melbourne VIC

Notions of Care, Bus Projects, Melbourne VIC

Cry of the Land, Heide Museum of Modern Art, Melbourne VIC

2020

Improvements & Reproductions, West Space, Melbourne VIC

Higher! Higher! Lower, Lower. Louder! Louder! Softer, Softer, Shimmer, Netherlands

2019

Islands Become Mountains, Dominik Mersch Gallery, Sydney NSW

Strangers and Those We Hold Dear, MADA Gallery, Melbourne VIC

Installation Contemporary, Sydney Contemporary, Carriageworks, Sydney NSW

Zephyr, Walker Street Gallery, Melbourne VIC

Healing Practices, Bundoora Homestead, Melbourne VIC

2018

Australiyaniality, Holmes à Court Gallery @ no. 10, Perth WA

Dissident Assemblies, Kings Artist Run, Melbourne VIC

Standing Still; looking back, looking forward, curated by Jessica Clark, Incinerator Gallery, Melbourne VIC

A thousand times the rolling sun, curated by Gabriel Curtin, HM Prison, Beechworth, VIC

Summer Residency: Museum Incognita, Blindside, Melbourne VIC

2017

When the other meets the other, curated by Biljana Ciric, Cultural Centre of Belgrade, Serbia

Holding is next to knowing, Sister Gallery, Adelaide SA

Sky Country, Blak Dot Gallery, Melbourne VIC

Feedback Loop, Blak Dot Gallery, Melbourne VIC

The List, Seventh Gallery, Melbourne VIC

2016

Gathering Three Frogs, PastPresent, Kadist, San Francisco USA

Roll on, Roll on, Phenomena (until you are no more), curated by Eloise Sweetman, Jan van Eyck Academy, The Netherlands

FlashBlaks to the Future, curated by Megan Cope, MCA ARTBAR - Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney NSW

50 Shades of Blak, Blak Dot Gallery, Melbourne VIC

Tell me what you have and I will know what you are, Dissect Journal, Melbourne VIC

Seeking Asylum in Country: Western Australian Landscapes, PS Art Space, Fremantle WA

Radical Ecologies, PICA, Perth WA

Miss-Represent, Incinerator Art Space, Sydney NSW

Stations of the Cross, Wesley Church, Perth WA

2015

Revealed, Gallery Central, Perth WA

2011

Familiar Unfamiliar: Print Council of Australia 45th Anniversary Exhibition, curated by Rona Green; Swan Hill Regional Art Gallery, VIC (2013), s.p.a.c.e Gallery, TAS (2012), Tweed River Art Gallery, NSW (2012), C3 Contemporary Art Space, VIC (2011)

2009

Australia Does Not Exist, Kurb Gallery, Perth WA