About


Artist Bio

Kellie O’Dempsey creates site-generated installations and performances that integrate projection, video, collage, architectural space, gestural line, performance and digital drawing. Created in both solo and collaborative formats with sound artists and contemporary dance practitioners, O’Dempsey’s diverse practice explores, deconstructs and heightens the concept of public space as shared experience. O’Dempsey manipulates space and alters perception to transform and reinvigorate the familiar whilst establishing a sense of brilliance. Using performance, play, line and colour, O’Dempsey’s public productions enable an inclusive form of cultural interaction. The immersive site installation and performance drawing works invite the audience to engage directly with the visceral process of making. Kellie’s past performances include: Art after Dark; Pier 2/3; 18th Biennale of Sydney; MONA FOMA, Hobart; White Night Melbourne; and the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra and Botanica 2021 in the Brisbane Botanical Gardens.

Kellie O’Dempsey is represented by Jan Manton Galleries in Brisbane

CV

Qualifications

2014-2018

PhD (Research), Queensland College of Art, Griffith University, Brisbane

2008-2010

Masters of Visual Arts (Research), Southern Cross University, Lismore

1999

Graduate Diploma of Animation (Film and TV), Victorian College of the Arts, Melbourne Uni

2008-2010

Masters of Visual Arts (Research), Southern Cross University, Lismore

Employment

2021-2022

Lecturer in Design, University of Sunshine Coast, Sippy Downs

2014-2021

Convener, Lecturer and Course Designer, Queensland College of Art, Griffith University

Solo Exhibitions

2024

Wish you were here, Morten Bay Galleries, Redcliffe Art Gallery, QLD
Wish you were here, Grafton Regional Gallery, NSW

2023-2024

She does (working title), Noosa Regional Art Gallery, QLD

2022

Wish you were here, Northsite Contemporary Arts, Cairns, QLD
What did you say?, Robertson Park - Orange Regional Gallery, NSW

2024

She does (working title), Noosa Regional Art Gallery, QLD

2021

Wish you were here, Redlands Regional Gallery, Cleveland, QLD

2019

Outside the Lines, BAD (Brisbane Art and Design Festival) Museum of Brisbane, QLD
Negative Time (projection), Adelaide Festival Centre, SA

2018

The Never-ending line, NGA Play, National Gallery of Australia

2017

Away and Towards (PhD examination exhibition), QCA, Brisbane

2016

Line in the Night, Newcastle Gallery, NSW

2015

Draw/ Delay (12-hour performance), White Night, Melbourne
Traces of the in-between, Eagle Lane, Brisbane City Council

2012

Spectacle of Performance Drawing, Tweed Regional Gallery

2011

Paper Jam Roll, Judith Wright Centre for Contemporary Art, Brisbane

2008

There is roadkill on the walls, Brisbane Powerhouse

Collaborations

2019-2021

Hardenvale: Our Home in Suburbia, collaboration with Catherine O’Donnell and Todd Fuller, National Art School Gallery, Sydney, Wagga Wagga Art Gallery NSW, Bathurst Regional Gallery NSW

2018

Dirt & Ash, collaboration with Fiona Fell, Lismore Regional Gallery, NS

2017

Resistance Movement, collaboration with Jennifer Wroblewski Kentler International DrawingSpace, RedHook, Brooklyn, NY, USA

2016

Before I leave (silent), in collaboration with Piyali Ghosh (India), QCA POP Gallery

Group Exhibitions

2024

Time Changes Everything//Everything Changes Time, ISEA2024 (International Symposium of Electronic Art) Brisbane

2022-2023

Fair Play, Manly Art Gallery & Museum, NSW

2021

Botanica – Contemporary Art Outside, curated by Bell Ford –Brisbane Botanical Garden

2019

In[Place], Horizon Festival, Sunshine Coast
Paper Walls, Glen Eria Gallery, Melbourne

2017

International Art Switch, Jogja Gallery, Yogyakarta City, Indonesia

2016-2015

Inflection, Centre for Fine Print Research, University of West England, Bristol, UK
Just Draw, Bathurst and Newcastle Regional Gallery, Newcastle
Is this Art, d’Tour dlux, Shoalhaven Regional Gallery, NSW
Is this Art V2 (video work), dLux Artereal Gallery, Sydney
Drawn to Experience V2, POP Gallery, QCA, QLD and ANU Galleries, AC
Under Arena, (live drawing performance), Drawing International Brisbane Symposium
Draw to Perform2 (performance) N3mber Performance Space, London, UK

2013

Live in the Vitrine, Draw International Research Centre, Calyus, France

2014

Watershed, International Congress University of Barcelona, Spain
A general map of caves, Hawkesbury Regional Gallery, NSW

2012

Art after Dark (live performance), Pier2/3, 18th Biennale of Sydney
Mutable+Luminous (live performance drawing), MONA FOMA, Hobart

Industry Commissions

2023

Bloom, Public Art Performance, Orange Regional Gallery, NSW

2021

Botanica – Contemporary Art Outside, curated by Bell Ford –Brisbane Botanical

2019

Botanica, curated by Urban Art Projects – Projections in the Brisbane Botanical

Prizes, Awards, Residencies and Grants

2024

JADA Drawing Prize, Grafton Regional Gallery (finalist)
Sunshine Coast National Art Prize (finalist)

2023

Kedumba Drawing Award, NSW (finalist)

2022

Queensland Regional Art Award (winner) - Art for Life, Flying Art Alliance.QLD
JADA Drawing Prize, Grafton Regional Gallery (finalist)

2021

M16 Drawing Prize (finalist), Canberra Rockhampton Gallery, Artist in Residence

2020

Arts Queensland Individuals Grant
JADA Drawing Prize, Grafton Regional Gallery (finalist)

2019

Australia Council for the Arts, New Work Development Grant
Parramatta Artist Studio, NSW Artist in Residence
Mussellbrook Art Prize (Finalist)
NAVA Artist Grant

2018

JADA Drawing Prize, Grafton Regional Gallery (Finalist)
Bundanon Trust Artist Residency Program

2016

M16 Artspace Drawing Prize, CAPO Award
Unseen, Metro Arts, Professional Development Residency

2014-2017

Australian Postgraduate Award Scholarship– PhD Candidature, Griffith University

Industry Experience

2020-2021

Regional Arts Development Fund (RADF) Assessment Panel Member, Sunshine Coast

2019-2020

Experience Consultant and Designer for 2020 The Storytellers Museum of Brisbane

2016-2019

Public programs workshops design and delivery at: Gallery of Modern Art Brisbane (GOMA), Museum of Brisbane (MOB), Grafton Regional Gallery NSW, Tweed River Gallery, Lismore Regional Gallery, Griffith University & Museum of Brisbane

Publications and Media

2023

Article - A Performative Entanglement: The Art of Kellie O’Dempsey By Kevin Wilson

2016

O’Dempsey, Kellie, Platz, Bill. “A gathering dilemma: The Drawing International Brisbane Symposium”. Drawing: Research, Theory, Practice 1(2), 2016. 253-264.

2016

O’Dempsey, Kellie. “Performance Drawing: Framing the Elements”. Studio Research Journal 5(4),2016.

2013

O’Dempsey. “Performance Drawing: The Long Black Line”. New Scholar: An International Journal of the Humanities, Creative Arts and Social Sciences 2(1), 2013.

Collections

Bundanon Trust Collection, Australia, M on the bund, Shanghai, China Brisbane Powerhouse, Australia

dLux Archive, Sydney, Australia, Jogja Gallery, Yogyakarta City, Indonesia