Degree Show Catalogues
At Sydney College of the Arts we have an active gallery program of exhibitions featuring works by Australian and international contemporary visual artists and designers, staff, students and graduates.
Our galleries are an important resource and educational platform for students and staff. Through our galleries we offer opportunities to experience the curatorial process, to prepare and deliver an exhibition, and to build professional and academic networks.
The galleries also provide a space for staff and visiting professional artists, scholars and curators to develop, experiment and present research and artistic works to the college and broader arts communities.
By providing access to a range of challenging and innovative exhibitions and events, the galleries contribute signficantly to the public's understanding and appreciation of contemporary art.
Neil Roberts, Crossguard to the Left, 2000, glass and lead, 192 x 75 cm. Photo: Neil Roberts. Courtesy Estate of Neil Roberts and Helen Maxwell Art.
Exhibition Opening: Wednesday, 10 May, 6-8pm
Exhibition: 11 May – 17 June 2023
“Glass is breaking”, is a sentence in the present continuous tense, conjuring an anxiety-inducing state. Most artists who are experts in handling glass know how to control breakages. But they are also aware that glass is a subject, it has its own will, if you like. Glass will break. Present Continuous is also, therefore, about being continuously present to the possibilities of the medium in the moment of making: to allow glass to speak to its own immanent fragility. This movement from material to metaphor is taken up by all the artists in Present Continuous, none more so than by the late Neil Roberts whose sculptural understanding of glass is represented by works from 1983 to 2001. His influence continues in the work of the contemporary artists in this exhibition who are attuned to both the conceptual and formal properties of their media.
Present Continuous, curated by Barbara Campbell and Liam Garstang, proffers glass as material and metaphor. The exhibition features works from the Estate of Neil Roberts (1954–2002), alongside recent works by Sydney College of the Arts staff and alumni: Gabrielle Adamik, Consuelo Cavaniglia, Cobi Cockburn, Chris Dolman, Stevie Fieldsend, Paul Greedy, and Andrew Lavery.
Dylan Martorell, 'Eucalyptus Paucyflora'. Image courtesy of the artist. Photo: Aaron Rees.
Exhibition opening: Wednesday, 8 March, 6-8pm
Exhibition dates: Thursday, 9 March – Saturday, 22 April
An exhibition curated by Joyce Hinterding and David Haines. Ultra-Sonic weaves unconventional musical and sonic lines through the flotsam and jetsam of the shipwreck of installation art to create a new territory in an upended world – Peter Blamey, Lichen Kelp, Dylan Martorell, Naomi Oliver, and Kusum Normoyle create musical and non-musical kingdoms in which everything shakes and moves.
David Haines and Joyce Hinterding have worked collaboratively and independently for over twenty years to investigate the unseen forces that accompany our existence. Their multi-disciplinary practice employs antennae, scents, photographs, drawings, and actions, which illuminate otherwise invisible events. Haines & Hinterding's initial scientific enquiries are adapted into sophisticated, poetic provocations, which unsettle the privileging of vision or 'ocularcentrism'. They are represented by Sarah Cottier Gallery, Sydney and lecturers at Sydney College of the Arts.
Exhibition opening: Thursday, 1 December, 6pm-9pm,
Exhibition dates: Friday, 2 December - Saturday, 10 December
At the end of each academic year, we celebrate our graduating cohort and the culmination of their collective research and practice-based outcomes. We invite you to visit us at the Old Teachers’ College to see this year’s Graduation Show and enjoy the work of our students across disciplines.
Works will be on display from studio areas including Screen Arts, Photography, Painting, Printmedia, Sculpture, Ceramics, Glass and Jewellery and Object. In parallel with the exhibition, we are excited to be launching our second online showcase of New Contemporaries as a marker of our students’ achievements.
View the 2021 online showcase.
Recipient Announcement: 6-8pm, Wednesday, 28 September
Exhibition: 29 September - 29 October
The Fauvette Loureiro Memorial Scholarship supports SCA graduates who are practicing, professional artists working in any discipline through support for professional development facilitated by travel. There are two scholarship categories; emerging and mid-career/established. Selected by an independent panel of judges, applicants are assessed on their initial proposal and the associated exhibition of the finalists’ work. Recipients in each category will be announced at the exhibition opening.
Judging panel: Andrew Lavery (Co-Chair, Sydney College of the Arts); Danie Mellor (Artist); and Megan Monte (Director, Ngununggula, Southern Highlands Regional Gallery).
Finalists:
2022 Recipients:
Helen Grace, ‘Living Arrangements 1949–2019’ (Video still), featuring ‘An Artist Like A Soldier Without Politics Is An Assassin’, c. 1975-76 by Michael Callaghan, designed and co-printed with Ann Stephen. Courtesy of the artists.
Exhibition: 11 August - 10 September 2022
Opening Celebration: Wednesday, 10 August, 6-8 pm
friends, relations, lovers and ancestors is an exhibition focusing on the work of Helen Grace. The project presents a selection of Grace’s films, centering her work in a conversation extended through other contemporary practices. Works by Kay Abude, Sarah Rodigari, Grant Stevens, Leyla Stevens and Shan Turner-Carroll both connect to thematic concerns and technical approaches within Grace’s work and allow us to circle back to consider her extraordinary practice from new perspectives.
This exhibition is staged simultaneously across sydenham international, an experimental art space in Sydney’s Inner West and SCA Gallery. The project is part of SCA Gallery’s annual series partnering with an Artist Run Initiative that highlights the dynamic and collaborative activities of contemporary ARIs and connects the institution to independent projects.
Recipient Announcement: Wednesday, 18 May, 6-8 pm
Exhibition: 19 May - 25 June
Taking place every five years at Sydney College of the Arts and open to all, The David Harold Tribe Sculpture Award encourages interest and excellence in sculpture. This year, SCA is pleased to be able to offer an increased prize pool of $20,000.
The judging panel includes Joyce Hinterding (Senior Lecturer, Visual Art; Sydney College of the Arts); Dr Ann Elias (Professor of Art History and Visual Culture, University of Sydney); Biljana Jancic (Artist); and Neha Kale (Writer and Critic).
Finalists: Sarah Contos, Sasha Grbich, Allegra Holmes, Sarah Mosca, Kenzee Patterson, Robert Pulie, Shireen Taweel, and Brendan Van Hek.
Marikit Santiago, Ms Malacañang Series (Imelda) 2020. Acrylic, oil, and pyrography on found cardboard, 167cm x 122cm. Courtesy of the artist and Yavuz Gallery, Sydney.
Curated by Salote Tawale
Exhibition: 24 March - 30 April
Evening Celebration:
New date: Wednesday, 27 April, 6-8pm
In-Conversation: Saturday, 30 April, 1-2pm
Dr June Rubis & Artist Tiyan Baker
A park is not a forest brings together artists with intersectional identities whose work draws on their own cultural heritage and the contemporary realities of living in the diaspora.
Featured artists include Tiyan Baker, James Nguyen, Claudia Nicholson, Sione Monu and Marikit Santiago.
Watch James & Salote In Conversation.
Read Salote Tawale's catalogue essay (pdf, 900KB)
Memo Review: A Park is Not a Forest by Verónica Tello
Exhibition: 10 February – 5 March 2022
Finissage: Tuesday, 1 March, 6-8pm
2021 Recipients:
2021 Finalists:
The Fauvette Loureiro Memorial Scholarship supports SCA graduates who are practising, professional artists working in any discipline through support for professional development facilitated by travel. There are two scholarship categories; emerging and mid-career/established. Selected by an independent panel of judges, applicants are assessed on their initial proposal and the associated exhibition of the finalists’ work. Recipients in each category will be announced at the exhibition opening.
Enquiries: sca.enquiries@sydney.edu.au
Past recipients include: Yasmin Smith (2020 Established), Kalanjay Dhir (2020 Emerging), Chris Dolman (2019), Penelope Cain (2018), Nick Dorey (2017), Biljana Jancic (2016), Julian Day (2015), Jonny Niesche (2014), Vicky Browne (2013), Mark Shorter (2012), Alana Hunt (2011) and Justene Williams (2010).