Dr Clare Milledge | UNSW Research

My Expertise

Contemporary Art, Painting, Ecology and the Arts

Keywords

painting

australian contemporary art

Fields of Research (FoR)

Visual arts, Fine arts, Performance art, Creative and professional writing

Biography

Dr Clare Milledge (b 1977) is a Senior Lecturer and artist, she lives and works in Warrang/Sydney Cove (AU) on unceded Bidjigal and Gadigal Country.

Distinguished for her hinterglasmalerei paintings—a reverse-glass technique rooted in Byzantine traditions—Milledge engages abstraction, fragmentation, and encryption, creating text-based, geometric and figurative paintings and installations. Using adapted fieldwork methodologies she draws upon and reimagines contemporary environments, cultivating a polymorphic visual language that unsettles conventional structures of knowledge within a shared material lexicon.

My Grants

Year	Grant value	Name	Event body
2024	$22,779.80	Arts Projects for Individuals and Groups (application supported by UNSW School Seed Funding)	Creative Australia
2024	$7,433.00	CreateNSW funding	CreateNSW
2021	$50,000.00	Arts Projects for Individuals and Groups	Creative Australia
2018	$26,870.00	Arts Projects for Individuals and Groups	Creative Australia
2017	$5,000.00	Artist Support Round 2	ArtsNSW
2017	$16,180.00	Arts Projects for Individuals and Groups	Creative Australia
2015	$5,000.00	Artist Support Round 1	ArtsNSW
2015	$10,000.00	ArtStart Grant	Creative Australia
2014	$1,250.00	NSW Artists’ Grant Scheme	ArtsNSW
2010	$10,000.00	New Work Grant for Emerging Visual Artists	Creative Australia

My Qualifications

2007-2013

Doctor of Philosophy, The Artist Shaman and “the Gift-of-Sight”, Sydney College of the Arts, The University of Sydney, Sydney

Supervisors: Associate Professor Ann Elias and Matthys Gerber

2008 PhD candidate, Sydney College of the Arts, The University of Sydney/ Universität der Künste, Berlin

Supervisors: Associate Professor Ann Elias and Matthys Gerber/Lothar Baumgarten

2006

Bachelor of Visual Arts (Painting), Honours 1, Sydney College of the Arts, The University of Sydney, Sydney and Statens Kunst Akademi, Oslo

Supervisors: Matthys Gerber and Gunter Reski

2004-2005

Bachelor of Visual Arts (Painting), Sydney College of the Arts, The University of Sydney, Sydney

1999

Bachelor of Visual Arts (Foundation), The College of Fine Arts, The University of New South Wales, Sydney

My Awards

2007-2010

University Postgraduate Award, Sydney College of the Arts, The University of Sydney, Sydney

My Research Activities

Significant exhibitions include: Knowing Otherwise, Monash University Museum of Art (2026); complex notophyll vine-forest: ground-proof, Lismore Regional Gallery (2025); From the Other Side, ACCA (2023); Living Patterns: Contemporary Australian Abstraction, QAGOMA (2023); Maluw Adhil Urngu Padanu Mamuy Moesik, IMA, Meanjin/Brisbane (2023); Still Life, Buxton Contemporary (2022); Second Sight: Witchcraft, Ritual, Power, UQ Art Museum (2019); Remedial Works, PICA (2017); Strigiformes: Binocular, Binaural, Museet for Samtidskunst, Nasjonalmuseet, Oslo, NO (2017); What Remains, Fotogalleriet, Oslo, NO (2017); and Dämmerschlaf, Artspace (2016).

Milledge exhibited in the 23rd Biennale of Sydney: rīvus (2022); the NGV Triennial (2020); and Magic Object, Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art (2016).

She was a four-time finalist in the Fauvette Loureiro Travelling Art Scholarship (2016, 2017, 2020, 2023) and a three-time finalist in the Helen Lempriere Travelling Art Scholarship (2007, 2008, 2010). Her work is held in major collections including the NGV, Buxton Contemporary, Monash University Museum of Art, University of Melbourne, and Artbank.

She has undertaken residencies at Carriageworks, Sydney (2021), Artspace, Sydney (2015), Cove Park, Scotland (2025).

My Research Supervision

Supervision keywords

australian contemporary art

Areas of supervision

Visual Arts, Contemporary Art, Fine Art, Painting, Installation, Sculpture, Experimental and Collaborative Practice.

Currently supervising

Current

Benita Newberry Laylim (MFA) primary with secondary Di Baker Smith

Elaine Su-Hui Chew (MFA) joint with Di Baker Smith

Remy Faint (MFA) secondary with primary Felicity Fenner

Fiona Macpherson (MFA) joint with Tim Gregory

Felix Cehak (PhD) joint with Dr Izabela Pluta, "Birdsong in the Australian Rainforest: Natural History in Contemporary Art Practice. How can the intersection of contemporary art and folk conservation practices communicate ecological knowledge, with a specific focus on the Albert's Lyrebird."

Previous Supervisions:

Anthea Caddy (PhD) secondary with primary Caleb Kelly

Aulia Ibrahim Yeru (PhD) joint with Associate Professor Felicity Fenner, "Bentang Sungai | Riverscape: Art and Ecology as Spatial Practice."

Bronwyn Bailey-Charteris (PhD), secondary with Associate Professor Felicity Fenner, "The Hydrocene: Curatorial theory of the confluence of art, water and the climate crisis in eco-aesthetics."

Jacqui Driver (MFA), joint with Professor Jill Bennett, "The Mothering Thicket: Investigating the Impact of Trans-generational Trauma through Installation Based Print Practice."

Megan Hanson (MFA) joint with Debra Phillips, "‘I' am not one: co-producing the nomadic subject at the intersection of art and fashion".

Genevieve Reynolds (MFA) joint with Dr Grant Stevens, "Godflesh: The Impact of Digital Image Technologies and Interfaces on Representations of Space in Contemporary Painting".

Min Wong (MFA) joint with Dr Grant Stevens, "Revisiting esoteric traditions and practices through contemporary sculptural practice".

Jana Hawkins-Andersen (MFA) joint with Dr Lindsay Kelley

Lisa Sammut (MFA) joint with Dr Tim Gregory

My Engagement

2024

Bronwyn Bailey-Charteris; The Hydrocene: Eco-Aesthetics in the Age of Water; pp. 105 – 128

Manchán Magan; ‘What is the preserving shrine?’ thoughts on Clare Milledge’s exhibition bramble-hound, heron-wound: two stone wolves. catalogue essay

Misong Kim; Adam Lee and Clare Milledge Bring Lore and Language to Light; Ocula in collaboration with Melbourne Art Foundation

Vanessa Francesca; Exhibition review: From The Other Side, Australian Centre for Contemporary Art; Artshub

2023

Josephine Mead; The Intuitive Abilities of Clare Milledge, Artguide, feature

ACCA, From the other side, catalogue

2022

Emma Pinsent; Clare Milledge Imbas: a well at the bottom of the sea; BAM, feature, pp. 52 – 55

Anabelle Lacroix; Circles of Resonance; Art Monthly Australasia, feature, pp. 72 – 79

Biennale of Sydney, rīvus a glossary of water catalogue

Miriam Cosic, ‘Sydney biennale 2022: amid floods arrives art with an urgent climate message’, The Guardian Australia, March

2020

Tom Melick, Living Annotations; NGV Triennial, catalogue: Pt 2 Illuminations, pp. 136 – 149

2019

Amelia Wallin; Revisiting colour problems: Emily Vanderpoel, Hilma af Klint, Becca Albee, Clare Milledge; Artlink: Local Colour; Issue 39:1 | March 2019 pp. 30 – 35

2018

Anna Dunnill, ‘Sacks of wind: a rock harder than rock’, exhibition preview, Art Guide Australia, December 2018

Ned Reilly, ‘Vegesingularity’, Art + Australia, issue 3, (54.2): Unnaturalism, May 2018, pp. 54 – 63

2017

Anna Dunnill, ‘Remedial Works’, exhibition review, Runway Experimental Arts

Andreas Breivik and Victoria Duffee, ‘Clare Milledge at the Museum for Contemporary Art’, performance review, Vi ser på Kunst

‘Symposium: Clare Milledge’, Museum, Issue 7: Factory

Mandy Campbell; Eye-popping art comes to Laneway Sydney; The University of Sydney News

2016

Astrid Lorange, Reading Paintings and Poetry, Blackbox Manifold, Issue 16

Astrid Lorange, Alien Intimacy, exhibition text for Skara Thynge: Travelling Stock Reserves, The Commercial Gallery, Sydney

Magic Object: Adelaide Biennial, exhibition catalogue

Molly McPhee; Stigma: The Work of the Straightener; exhibition catalogue for Erewhon

Vikki McInnes; Dark Presents, Dark Futures; exhibition catalogue for Erewhon

Marian Tubbs, ‘Vortices and abstraction: and in the end relations’, Oberon, vol. 2, pp. 50 – 54

Craig Judd, ‘This Thing’, catalogue essay, Magic Object: Adelaide Biennial

Sebastian Goldspink, ‘Elements: The Shaman’, catalogue essay, Magic Object: Adelaide Biennial

Craig Judd, ‘The Mnemonic Mirror’, Artlink, exhibition review, 3 June 2016

Jane Llewellyn; Adelaide Biennial 2016: Where the Magic Happens; The Adelaide Review

2015

Tom Melick, Sit on me, said the rock and I’ll speak, unpublished text for Behavioral Modernity, Vienna

Neha Kale, Searching for Meaning Amid the Mess, Vault Magazine, July 2015, Issue 10, pp. 18 – 19

2014

Tom Melick, A Speculative Dictionary for Clare Milledge, exhibition text for Theoretical Regression: A Warm Sheen Against Received Ideas, The Commercial Gallery, Sydney

Kyla McFarlane, The Suppository of All Wisdom, Altus Duel: Total Environment, Gertrude Contemporary, Melbourne; exhibition catalogue essay

2013

Isobel Parker Phillip, Clare Milledge, Motivated Reasoning: Strategic, Tactical, Operational, The Commercial Gallery, 22 March – 13 April 2013, review, UN Projects, Issue 7.1 p. 19

2012

Catherine Bennetts-Cash, Un-Acclimatised, exhibition catalogue, Monash University Museum of Art, Melbourne

2011

Margaret Farmer, Bad Angle, review, Artlink Magazine, Vol. 31, #3 p. 89

Anne Ferran, On Abjection and Love, exhibition catalogue for The Stain, Verge Gallery, The University of Sydney, Sydney

The Helen Lempriere Travelling Art Scholarship, exhibition catalogue, Artspace, Sydney

2009

Ian Houston-Shadwell, Art is not Epistemology, exhibition catalogue, The Last Visible Dog, Grantpirrie, Sydney

Biljana Jancic, In The Manner Of Excess, exhibition catalogue, From the Scrapheap of False Metaphors and Other Draft Deceits, Gallery 9, Sydney

2008

The Helen Lempriere Travelling Art Scholarship, exhibition catalogue, Artspace, Sydney

Alison Kubler, As Black as Stone, exh. cat. Neo Goth: Back in Black, University of Queensland Art Museum, Brisbane