Abbra Kotlarczyk (born Mullumbimby, Arakwal Country | based Naarm/Melbourne, so-called Australia) maintains a research-based practice that is articulated through modes of conceptual art making and writing of criticism, poetry and prose. She is an independent curator and academic editor for socially-engaged, practice-led artistic research. Her practice is hinged on visual, linguistic and increasingly sensorial modes of inquiry that take place trans-historically through expanded notions of care, labour, queerness, publication, citizenry and embodied poetics.

Education

2015—Graduate Certificate of Art (Art History), University of Melbourne, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2005—Bachelor of Creative Industries (Visual Arts), Queensland University of Technology, Turrbal/Brisbane, Australia

Curatorial Projects

2023—figuring ground, Grafton Regional Gallery, Grafton, Bundjalung Country, Australia
2021—of Freighted Specs, of Bio- Dwelling, Victorian College of the Arts, University of Melbourne, Fine Arts (Honours) virtual exhibition
2020-21—Micro-(bial) Tenancies, BLINDSIDE’s annual Emerging Curator Mentorship under mentorship of Kyla McFarlane, online and on-site at BLINDSIDE Gallery, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2019—m_othering the perceptual ars poetica [with Antonia Sellbach], Counihan Gallery, Brunswick, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2018-19—Queer Economies [with Madé Spencer-Castle], presented by Midsumma Festival in association with Bus Projects, Abbotsford Convent Foundation and the Centre for Contemporary Photography, with support from Perimeter Editions and the David McDiarmid Estate. Presented across multiple sites in Naarm/Melbourne, Australia  

Solo Exhibitions

2022—To touch or strike a fondant ground [north and south propositions], Bus Projects and West Space, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2021—A sonorous draft; a lexicon of widjamming, BLINDSIDE Gallery, Naarm/Melbourne
2016—Javelins in the Scrum, North Projects, Ōtautahi/Christchurch, Aotearoa/New Zealand
2015—Dear History, Painting, c3 Contemporary Artspace, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2011—Unstable Assemblages, Somewhere Gallery, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2010—Igneous Faux Pas [Rock World], The Residence of 150 Johnston Street, Fitzroy, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia

Group Exhibitions

2020—Venus in Thorns, Trocadero Artspace, Footscray, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2019—m_othering the perceptual ars poetica, Counihan Gallery, Brunswick, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia.
2016—the scribe notes, slight, with Kate Hill, Bus Projects, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2014—Re-raising Consciousness, TCB Art Inc., Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2014—End Paper, a print exhibition and publication by Polar Space, launched at The Good Copy and exhibited as part of Tabularium, SLOPES, both Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2014—NEW, Lindberg Galleries, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2013—Launch Exhibition, Re-opening of Lindberg Galleries, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2012—Visible Horizons, part of a cultural exchange between Airy Gallery, Kofu, Japan and The Library Art Space, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2011—Painting 11 therewillbenoskullsinthisexhibition, Lindberg Galleries, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2011—The Blake Prize, Director’s Cut Online Exhibition, Eora/Sydney, Australia

Selected Published Writing

2023—Sensoria Against Separation, Gertrude Emerging Writers Program under mentorship of Tara McDowell, To Be Magazine and online, Gertrude Contemporary and Art Ink, Naarm/Melbourne 
2020—Labour as Compost: Reimagining the conditions and practices of m_othering in Jahnne Pasco-White: Kin, edited by N.A.J. Taylor, Unlikely Journal and Art Ink, Naarm/Melbourne
2020—Isadora Vaughan: Overlapping Magisteria, the 2020 Macfarlane Commissions (catalogue text), Australian Centre for Contemporary Art (ACCA), Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2020—Breath Work, Lieu Journal Issue 3: Peace, Naar/Melbourne, Australia and Tãmaki/Auckland, Aotearoa/New Zealand
2020—A list of doors and some of their potential functions, poetic response to Briony Galligan’s Open Every Door, Alfred Deakin Place, Ballarat, Australia
2020—Geological Pit Stops: Kate Hill and Isadora Vaughan, Artlink Magazine, Vol. 40, No. 1: It’s Time, Kaurna/Adelaide, Australia
2020—Crowning’s Story, Galore, poetry commission as part of Venus in Thorns exhition, curated by Jake Treacy, Trocadero Artspace, Footscray, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2019—Sonar for Conception, Cordite Poetry Review, Issue 92: NO THEME VIII, Australia
2019—Queer Uses of Colour: A Tinted Hermeneutics, Artlink Magazine, Vol. 39, No. 1: Local Colour, Kaurna/Adelaide, Australia
2019—What alerts, alters, publication text for There are no failures, everything is working, Artspace Aotearoa, Tāmaki/Auckland, Aotearoa/NZ
2019—A fontanelle opens; we figure absences, catalogue text for A message in the collar, KINGS Artist Run Gallery at HOBIENNALE, curated by Jeremy Eaton and Katie Ryan, Nipaluna/Hobart, Australia
2019—In Material Per Versions, Part I: A Cappella for Powering Partic[ip]les, program catalogue text for Channels Festival 2019: International Biennial of Video Art, Naarm/Melbourne and greater Victoria, Australia
2019—In Material Per Versions, Part II: Autobiography of an Afterlife, program catalogue text for Satellite: becoming [in]determinate, curated by James Carey, BLINDSIDE Gallery, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2019—[FRAME.MID.CRUX], exhibition catalogue essay for Frameworks by Antonia Sellbach, Nicholas Thompson Gallery, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2018—My Mother’s Labour: Darcey Bella Arnold, un Extended, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia. 
2018—I, Us, Them: A dark triad, radiating out from a centre and closing in, Art & Australia, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2018—Residency Projects, Boorhaman, Victoria, Art+australia Online, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2017—Thirty Million Carbon Stories, Stacked to Slender Crest: on the exhibition COAL by Hartmut Veit, exhibition catalogue essay, Victorian College of the Arts, Naarm/Melboure, Australia
2017—Wild Rocks and Tamed Pathways: Christine Willcocks, exhibition catalogue essay, Flinders Lane Gallery, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2016—Cruisings of the recent TarraWarra Biennial, Art+australia Online, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2016—the scribe notes, slight, Abbra Kotlarczyk + Kate Hill in conversation, Bus Projects exhibition catalogue designed by Adam Cruickshank, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2015—Radical Living Archives and Trans* Embodiment: Shu Lea Cheang’s Brandon, Transgender Studies Quarterly, Duke University Press, North Carolina, USA
2015—Re: Sweeping Exchanges: Notes on the Feminist Body Politic, un. Magazine Issue 9.1, edited by Pip Wallis and sub-edited by Beth Caird and Aodhan Madden, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2015—Layers of contingency, or, the dusting of modern timepieces: James Carey, exhibition catalogue text, KINGS Artist Run Gallery, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2015—KORE Belief Systems: Ben Sendy-Smithers, exhibition catalogue text, KINGS Artist Run Gallery, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2015—Some of them got the first look, curated by Jack Brown, exhibition catalogue text, KINGS Artist Run Gallery, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2014—How's the Weather We're Having: Part I Grievous Bodily Collage, Carets and Sticks, Los Angeles, USA
2014—Grey / Dasein: Ontology of a Colour, End Paper by Polar Space, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2014—Art After The End Of Philosophy. Part I : Hito Steyerl's Adorno's Grey, Carets & Sticks, Los Angeles, USA
2013—Partially Feigned Mysticism and Pot Shamanism: Shana Moulton at The Western Front Society, Decoy Magazine, Vancouver, Canada
2013—Braids: Plaiting For Parity, The Way Cornrows Hug Your Head - Conversations with Rua Minx (Donna Huanca), Aja Rose Bond and Shaun Dacey at Access Gallery, Decoy Magazine, Vancouver, Canada
2013—How Did I Get Here?: The Fronts and Means of Social Practices, Decoy Magazine, Vancouver, Canada
2012—Corroborative Spaces: Part I - Mike Nelson, space that saw (platform for a performance in two parts), Das Platforms, Eora/Sydney, Australia 
2012—Corroborative Spaces: Part II - Bruce Nauman Room With My Soul Left Out, Room That Does Not Care, Das Platforms, Eora/Sydney, Australia
2012—Antithesis in Art: The Case for Counter-Iconoclasm, Criterion Magazine, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2012—The Link Between Objects and Their Ideas, Criterion Magazine, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2012—The Orientations of Artists in the C21st and the Dying Archetype of Romantic Struggle, Criterion Magazine, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2012—Human Bonds in the Fluid World: Modern Ideologies of Land and Water - Upstream Gallery, The Netherlands, Criterion Magazine, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia

Grants, Residencies, Awards + Professional Experience

2023—Winner, Residency Artist Prize, Footscray Art Prize, Footscray Community Arts Centre, Naarm/Melbourne
2022—Winner, Overland Judith Wright Poetry Prize, Overland Literary Journal, Naarm/Melbourne 
2020—National Assistance Program for the Arts, Sidney Myer Fund & The Myer Foundation Grant 
2019—Emerging Writer’s Program Recipient: 4/4, Artspace Aotearoa, Tāmaki/Auckland, Aotearoa/NZ
2019—Artist In Residence, Ralph Woodford Residency, Arakwal/Mullumbimby, Australia
2018—Australia Council for the Arts, Arts Projects For Individuals and Groups 
2018—Creative Victoria, VicArts Grant
2018—Judge alongside Kelly Gellatly (Director, Ian Potter Museum of Art), Midsumma Australia Post Art Prize, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2016-17—Assistant Editor, Artist Research in the Future Academy by Danny Butt, Intellect Books, UK + USA
2016—Workshop facilitator, Timecapsule, part of Javelins in the Scrum, North Projects, Christchurch, Aotearoa/New Zealand
2015—Artist in residence, Forms of Encounter and Exchange, Artist Field School at Laughing Waters, Eltham, an artist residency and research initiative through the Centre for Cultural Partnerships, Victorian College of the Arts, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia 
2015—Emerging Writer’s Program Recipient, KINGS Artist Run Gallery, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2015—Archive Assistant, Sue Ford Archive, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2013—Archive Assistant, Western Front Society, Vancouver, Canada
2012—Portfolio Review Recipient, NODE Centre for Curatorial Studies, Berlin, Germany
2012—Artist In Residence, ToosNeger Atelier, Dordrecht, The Netherlands
2011—The Fleurieu Art Prize, Finalist, Youth Scholarship Award, McLarren Vale, Kaurna/South Australia
2008—6 Degrees Art Prize, Finalist, Frankston Arts Centre, Frankston, Australia
2006-2010—Gallery Assistant + Website Content Manager, Arc One Gallery, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2006-2008—Editor + Content Manager, Artlink Magazine, Kaurna/Adelaide, Australia
2005-2007—Studio Assistant: Robert Owen (Naarm/Melbourne), Sue Ford (Naarm/Melbourne) and James Guppy (Arakwal/Byron Bay)

Press

2019—Jesse Boyd-Reid, Queer Economies, Art & Australia, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2016— Robyn Maree Pickens, From a deep burial pit I throw a femur so high it becomes a space station, commissioned text for Javelins in the Scum, North Projects, Ōtautahi/Christchurch, Aotearoa/New Zealand
2016—Madeleine Dore, Nine myths that shouldn't stop you working in the arts, Arts Hub, July 25, 2016, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2015—Interview with Angela Connor for {fierce} LATITUDES, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2014—Dan Rule, In The Galleries : NEW Exhibition Review, The Age Newspaper, May 24, 2014, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2013—Dan Rule, In The Galleries : Lindberg Launch Exhibition Review, The Age Newspaper, September 21, 2013, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2013—Alexandra Djurichkovic, Lindberg Relaunches and Greenaway Rejuvinates, Art Collector, September 2013, Australia
2013—Nicholas Forrest, David Moulday on Relaunching Lindberg Galleries in Melbourne, BlouinArtInfo Australia, October 8, 2013, Australia

Screenings + Performances

2015—Performance Participant, Communion: A Sonic Wandering in the Dark by Ann Fuata as part of Liquid Architecture: What Would A Feminist Methodology Sound Like, West Space, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2013—Splash Page Exhibitions Program, Polar Space, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2009—City Nights, Pool.org, Screening at Federation Square, Naarm/Melbourne, Australia
2009—Digital Fringe, various screens across Naarm/Melbourne, Australia