Australian Women Artists

The podcast

Ep. 40 Amber Wallis

Amber Wallis has carved out a distinctive space in contemporary painting with canvases that blend abstraction and figuration, intimacy and intensity. Her art often emerges from deeply personal narratives.

Amber holds a Bachelor of Visual Arts from the Canberra School of Art and a Master of Visual Arts from the Victorian College of the Arts. The VCA years were formative: she pushed an already fluid practice toward a deliberately unstable seam between figuration and abstraction, learning to let images “stain” their way into being on raw or lightly primed linen.

In 2008 Amber won the Brett Whiteley Travelling Art Scholarship, one of Australia’s most significant awards for an emerging painter. The prize took her to Paris for a three-month residency at the Cité Internationale des Arts, and we had an interesting discussion on the affect that had not just on her, but on her art.

By 2009, Amber's raw, expressive works were exhibiting regularly along Australia’s East Coast.

By the mid-2010s, Wallis had consolidated a national profile.

Amber's work entered more collections and she was shortlisted for major prizes: Sunshine Coast Art Prize, the Arthur Guy Memorial Painting Prize and the Evelyn Chapman Art Award. In 2022, she won the inaugural Wollumbin Art Award and has been a finalist in numerous other awards including the Sir John Sulman Prize (twice), Bayside Painting Prize, Geelong Contemporary Art Award.

It was a really interesting conversation as we covered a lot of her life and art.

Head to the link in my bio to hear this episode.

Amber is represented in Brisbane by Jan Murphy Gallery

Images

1. AW by Kate Holmes

2. Women 2020 oil on linen 120x150

3. Soft figure 2025 oil on linen 135x120

4. Glowing house structure 2025 oil on linen 135x120

5. Orange warm protective watchers 2024 oil on linen 150x120

Australian Women Artists

The podcast

Ep. 39 Justine Kong Sing

A conversation with Monique Watkins (AGNSW)

A few of Justine Kong Sing's works are on display at the new exhibition at the Art Gallery of NSW, Dangerously Modern, Australian Women Artists in Europe 1890-1940. I had the privilege of sitting down with Monique Watkins to discuss this extraordinarily talented artist who has been largely overlooked in the Australian art canon.

.....My special guest today on the podcast is curator Monique Watkins, and this discussion took place in the Art Gallery of NSW. We were discussing the relatively unknown but brilliant, Justine Kong Sing.

Monique Watkins is a curator, writer and editor with experience working at leading cultural organisations in Sydney, including Kaldor Public Art Projects, White Rabbit Gallery and the Art Gallery of New South Wales. She contributed an essay on Justine for the accompanying book to the exhibition Dangerously Modern: Australian Women Artists in Europe 1890-1940. Monique's research has helped pave the way for a wider appreciation of Justine's work.

Justine Kong Sing grew up in rural New South Wales during the 1870s and 1880s. As the daughter of a Hong Kong Chinese miner, she navigated the (I guess the polite way of saying it is...) complex social landscape of late 19th and early 20th century Australia ...all the while establishing herself as a skilled artist whose work would eventually gain recognition in major galleries across Australia and Europe. It’s a fascinating story often overlooked.

To hear our conversation head to the link in my bio above or head to wherever you find your podcasts.

Instagram images

1. Me, 1912

watercolour on ivory

Dimensions

6.1 x 4.5 cm

2. Chums 1911

Materials used

watercolour on ivory

Dimensions

9.5 x 7.4 cm

3. Madame Sze, wife of the Chinese Minister
(c. 1914-1916)

watercolour on ivory

Measurements
9.5 × 7.7 cm

Australian Women Artists

The podcast

Ep. 38 Robyn Sweaney

Robyn Sweaney is a contemporary artist who began exhibiting her work regularly from about 1992.

Her early work included still-life compositions, landscapes, and portraiture.

After relocating to northern New South Wales, she was inspired by her surrounds by painting houses. She could merge her philosophical interests with visual storytelling. And the paintings are beautifully reminiscent. But not in a ‘I prefer the old days’ sort of way. She just captures a moment.

More specifically... “Domestic dwellings divulge more than their mere exteriors, functioning as physical incarnations of the aesthetic, ideological and social structures influencing human behaviour. Informed by travel through familiar and unfamiliar rural and suburban places, Robyn finds that, ‘certain elements of place resonate an unexplainable reaction within me – something ignites deep within memory. The landscape is somehow opened up by the search itself and my response can reach beyond its visual appearance’.”

Her work has been described as emotional portraits of place, capturing the essence of lived experience through facades and fences.

Robyn has been involved in over one hundred group exhibitions. She was the winner of the Wynne Trustees’ Watercolour Prize, AGNSW (2019) and has been the finalist of many major awards including multiple times for the Wynne Prize, Salon Des Refusés, Jacaranda Acquisitive Drawing Prize, Mosman Art Prize, Paddington Art Prize, Moran Prize, Portia Geach Memorial Award and has also been a finalist in the Sulman Prize. Her work is held in public and private collections throughout Australia.

Head to the link in my bio for our podcast conversation

Images

RS image: Danny Sweaney, Oh Boy Agency

Dreams and Imaginings, 2024

acrylic on polycotton

40 x 50 cm, 42.5 x 52.5 cm

Endless Blue, 2024

acrylic on polycotton

50 x 70 cm, 52.5 x 72.5 cm

Out of the Blue, 2024

acrylic on polycotton

95 x 135 cm, 97.5 x 137.5 cm

Parts of the whole, 2025

acrylic on polycotton

50 x 70 cm, 52.5 x 72.5 cm