Katie West is a Yindjibarndi woman, with an interdisciplinary practice that explores the renewal of human connections with and within the natural environment. West was selected as the winner of the inaugural Dominik Mersch Gallery / Victorian College of the Arts Award in 2017 with her Masters graduate exhibition piece ‘muhlu garrwarn / cool time hot time’. In this ongoing work, the artist engages with natural dyeing processes and text scores as ways to participate with the seasons. Through these repeated processes, her work moves from memory to the realm of instruction or storytelling. Her installations grow with the seasons as quiet and powerful evocations of place. To begin, West dyes her fabric using plant material and an open fire in muhlu (cool time). Following this, solar dyeing and sewing with the fabric and thread created in muhlu becomes the focus in garrwarn (hot time). Text scores serve to both document this process and guide the process again in future seasons.
Dominik Mersch Gallery is pleased to present the inaugural Dominik Mersch Gallery / Victorian College of the Arts Award (DMG / VCA Award), which affords a recent graduate the opportunity to have their work exhibited in a solo show at the gallery. The aim of the annual award is to support talented emerging artists and give them a space to test their practices in a professional and critical environment. Katie West, who is originally from Noongar Booja (Perth and surrounding areas) in Western Australia, was selected as the 2017 DMG / VCA Award winner for her installation ‘muhlu garrwarn / cool time hot time’. Dominik Mersch attended the Master’s graduate exhibition in Melbourne and worked with VCA Director Professor Jon Cattapan to select the winning artist. Both were struck by West’s sensitive, minimal work and its quiet evocation of memory and place. West has continued this work with a 2018 iteration that responds to both her personal connection to Yindjibarndi practices and the native plants of Rushcutters Bay in Sydney. “I was mesmerised by Katie’s installation. Simple and yet conceptually strong, it engages the viewer and stimulates memories,” Mersch said. “[Her work] also really sits well with my stable of artists, many of whom, like Katie, deal with nature and the environment.”
b.1988 Education 2017 Master of Contemporary Art, Victorian College of the Arts, University of Melbourne, VIC 2013 Bachelor of Art - Sociology, Murdoch University, WA 2009 Bachelor of Art - Visual Art, Edith Cowan University, WA Solo Exhibitions 2016 Decolonist, Perth Centre for Photography, Perth WA Decolonist, West Space, Next Wave Festival 2016, Melbourne VIC Group Exhibitions 2018 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 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
Awards / Grants / Professional Development 2017 Dominik Mersch Gallery Award, Victorian College of the Arts & Dominik Mersch Gallery Falls Creek Resort Indigenous Art Award, Victorian College of the Arts & Falls Creek Resort 2016 VicArts Grant, Creative Victoria 2015 Arts Projects for Individuals and Groups, Australia Council 2016 Arts Grants Program, City of Melbourne Kickstart, Next Wave Festival Collections
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece Central TAFE Art Collection, Perth, Australia Print Council of Australia, Melbourne, Australia Academic Appointments 2014-15 Sessional Academic, School of Nursing and Midwifery, Curtin University, Perth WA 2012-13 Sessional Academic, School of Art and Design, Justice and Equity Through Access (JETA), Curtin University, Perth WA Talks / Lectures 2017 Guest Artist, Interventions: Feminist and Conceptual Practices, Monash University, Melbourne VIC Revealed - Professional Development Program, Fremantle Arts Centre, Perth WA 2016 Slide Night Vol. IV, Perth Centre for Photography, Perth WA Amnesty International: Art is our ARTillery, Vivid Festival, Sydney NSW Mtalks: Consortium - How can art help us to think about the Land? MPavilion, Melbourne VIC Slide Night Vol. I, Perth Centre for Photography, Perth WA 2015 Guest Lecturer, Introduction to Indigenous Studies, Curtin University, Perth WA Guest Lecturer, Aboriginal Sustainability, Curtin University, Perth WA 2014 Artsource 6x6 Artist Talk, Paper Mountain, Perth WA
Katie West, 'muhlu garrwarn / cool time hot time', 2018, bush-dyed silk, cotton and thread, yirrarla (calico), cardboard, glass jars, bawa (water), watharn (green leaves), birditha (dry leaves), jurdubirri (native flower), burlaawa (non-native flower), birra (bark), dimensions variable.
www.dominikmerschgallery.com