Kym Maxwell

Liberty of the Screen, 2014,

Liberty of the Screen, 2014, Malahang Park, Heidelberg Heights, Banyule Public Art Commission with 10 volunteers.

Chiffon, rope, elastic, chalkboards, screen printed shirts, Dimensions variable.

Image: Kym Maxwell

Kym Maxwell, Informal Learning, 2017

George Paton Gallery, Melbourne University. Image: Kym Maxwell

Kym Maxwell, GOODWILL: Memoirs of Yard Play, 2013, wood, toy tyres, rope, bamboo box. Dimensions variable.

Image: Kym Maxwell

Kym Maxwell, (centre) Education's blood with water viaduct and soft cell stitches, 2017, cardboard tubing, gauze from previous sculpture, backdrop material, plaster, house paint, clear Perspex single filing cabinet, curriculum documentation, rope, cardboard tubing, elastic, pillows, 2050 X 600 X 450mm. Image: Christian Capurro.

Kym Maxwell with imagery from the Collingwood College Theatre Troupe, total install, storyboard poetics and pedagogic process, 2017, Westspace Gallery

(Left Wall) A Wharfie's Story Chalkboard Script, 2017. Chalkboard paint, MDF, chalk, screws.

(Foreground Floor) Kym Maxwell, My life as a wharfie learnerar, 2017, hessian sack, and twine wadding and newspaper, purchased girl overall dress, found crate, 810 x 800 x 1010 mm.

(Background Floor) Kym Maxwell, 21stC pedagogic process found-material stage design, 1950's Fruit Boxes, 2017, [re-installation instructions: requested seven boxes from Mac Donalds (take those given)], rope, gaffa tape, 'ethics guilt' tubing, glue, newspaper, found palette. Dimensions 1050 x 1100 x 1002 mm.

(Right Floor) Kym Maxwell, Swish or Swill, 2017. Found tin can, found tin cup, crate, carpet tiling, water and asbestos like talcum powder, 1200 X 900 X 1200 mm.

(Back Fabric) Kym Maxwell, The three institutes in watercolour: Monash, The Library at the Docks, Collingwood College, 2016-2017, watercolour, conte, pastel, pen, collage photocopies, watercolour paper, tape.

Image: Christian Capurro.

Kym Maxwell, Learning Labour, (installation view for A Wharfie’s Story), 2017, MFA Grad Show, B.6, Monash University, 2017.Image: Christian Capurro.

Kym Maxwell, Sets and their institutional setting, (Left) Scene 2: The North Wharf; (Middle) Scene 9: 'Jim Beggs Report to Pier 9 immediately' (Middle) Scene 4,5,6: Waterside Workers Bureau, (Right) Scene 1: Playground (2015), 2017. Cotton, house paint, aluminum frame, Velcro2450 x 40 x2020mm. Installation MFA Grad Show, B.6, Monash University, 2017. Image: Christian Capurro.

Works in Progress and art Documentation

IMAGE 1: Sculptures and Drawings in progress (insitu install) Kym Maxwell, 2025. Ai Pioppi: beautiful chaos, taboos and conventions

IMAGE 2: Pencil drawing in progress Kym Maxwell 30 x 42cms, 2025 . Ai Pioppi: beautiful chaos, taboos and conventions

IMAGE 3: Research documentation by Kym Maxwell for exhibition, 2025. Ai Pioppi: beautiful chaos, taboos and conventions. Research documentation funded by Creative Australia and the Ian Potter Cultural Trust

IMAGE 4: Pencil drawing in progress Kym Maxwell 30 x 42cms, 2025 . Ai Pioppi: beautiful chaos, taboos and conventions

IMAGE 5: Research documentation by Kym Maxwell for exhibition, 2025. Ai Pioppi: beautiful chaos, taboos and conventions. Research documentation funded by Creative Australia and the Ian Potter Cultural Trust

IMAGE 6: Liberty of the Screen, 2014, Malahang Park, Heidelberg Heights, Banyule Public Art Commission with 10 volunteers.

Chiffon, rope, elastic, chalkboards, screen printed shirts, Dimensions variable. Image: Kym Maxwell

IMAGE 7: Kym Maxwell, Informal Learning, 2017

IMAGE 8: As labeled in image

IMAGE 9: ‘Objects of Longing’ is among the creative outcomes of Maxwell’s time with the students and staff at Dandenong Primary School that can be seen in Shapes of Knowledge. In the gallery, they are displayed alongside artworks from the Monash University Collection that were first encountered by the students on their visit to MUMA, and which informed various stages of their research.

IMAGE 10: As labeled in image

Select ARTIST CV

2016 Master of Fine Arts, Monash University
2007 Masters of Education, RMIT
1993 Bachelor of Fine Arts (Drawing), VCA, Melbourne University

UPCOMNG EXHBITIONS

2025 Ai Pioppi: beautiful chaos, taboos and conventions, Project Space Artery Cooperative, Northcote

EXHIBITION HISTORY

Solo Exhibitions
2017 Refraction, Kingston Arts Centre, Melbourne

Storyboard poetics and pedagogic process, West Space, Melbourne

Informal Learning, George Paton Gallery, Melbourne University, Melbourne

Learning Labour, (MFA Exhibition), Monash University, Caulfield Campus B.6, Melbourne
2014 Liberty of The Screen (Public commission), Malahang Reserve playground

Select Group Exhibitions

2019 Shapes of Knowledge, Monash University Museum of Art, Melbourne, curated by Hannah Mathews

The Turn (w/ Ali McCann), Boadle Hall Incinerator Gallery, Melbourne

Un Projects 13.2: Artist Page Commission edited by Thomas Ragnar and Bobaq Sayed

Darebin Arts Prize, Bundoora Homestead, Victoria

2018 A Quiet Game of Disobediences at the New Student Precinct, Melbourne University, curated by Anita Spooner

2016 Cultural Capital and the Social Contract (with Mechanics institute), Melbourne Biennial Lab, Queen Victoria Market

2015 Video Visions, ACMI, Channels Video Art Festival, curator Nikki Lam

Embodied Sound by the Collingwood College Sound Collective for Liquid Architecture, Westspace, curator Danni Zuvela

Liberty of Imagination: Dueling Spheres (GOODWILL object research) Banyule Contemporary Art Fair, Hatch Contemporary Art Space, curator Claire Watson

Finalist, Substation Contemporary Art Prize, Substation, Newport, Victoria

BackFlip: Feminism and Humour in Contemporary Art, COFA Sydney, and Margaret Lawrence Gallery, VCA, curator Laura Castagnini

Choreography of Play, Artist in Residence, Olympic Village Campus, Banyule City Council

Industrial Estate (curator/artist) performance, exhibit and publication; furniture factory, Heidelberg West

PERFORMANCES
2016 Steiner Verse, Liquid Architecture event at Abbotsford Convent, with the students of Sophia Mundi, curator Joel Stern

2015 A Wharfie’s Story, at Buluk Park, The Library at the Docks, with Collingwood College Theatre Troupe, Joel Stern and Gerard Van Dyke

Select AWARDS/COMMISSION
2019 Bundanon Trust Residency, NSW: to explore sculptural researchfunded by the Australia Council.

2019 Australia Council, Career Development Grant: a mentorship with artist pedagogue Jordi Ferreiro, Barcelona, Spain, and research of Ai Pioppi, a kinetic playground in Vento, Italy.

2018 Ian Potter Cultural Trust, Emerging Artist Travelling Scholarship, mentorship and residency in Italy and Spain, June/July.

2018 Gandel Philanthropy Grant, MUMA Commission, Objects Are a Limbic System Embrace Their Logic (performance) and the Objects of Longing (exhibition) at Monash University Museum of Art with Dandenong Primary School, 2018- 2019. Creative Learning Partnerships, Creative Victoria in partnership with Monash University Museum of Art and Dandenong Primary School.

PUBLICATIONS

2019 A Wharfie’s Story - play, protest, consequence: Kym Maxwell and the Collingwood College Theatre Troupe. 320 pp. Edited by Kym Maxwell. Designed by Paul Mylecharane and Beayizt Worou. Copy Editor Sarah Gory. Texts by Rosemary Forde, Lisa Radford, Jim Beggs, Anais Ahkin, Kylie Wilkinson. Self-published with Ingram Press, Melbourne. Available at Perimeter Books, World Food Books, MCA Store and Amazon.

2019 Science Makers: Making with Sounds, by Anna Claybourne, published by Hachette Press, UK.

2014 Industrial Estate, 16pg. broadsheet publication. Designed by Ziga Testen, Limited edition 300. Printed in London and Melbourne, newsprint and Risograph insert. Essays by Lisa Radford and Harriet Morgan. Funded by Banyule City Council. Available at World Food Books.

Selected REVIEWS
2015 Dylan Rainforth, Wharfie's Story inspires collaboration between artist Kym Maxwell and Collingwood College, The Age, Nov 18

2014 Dan Rule, 'Uneducated', Around the Galleries The Age, Oct 3: Dylan Rainforth 'Uneducated, Counihan Gallery', The Age

Maura Edmond, 'Kym Maxwell Uneducated @ Counihan Gallery', Primer Website, September 12

Emily Sexton, 3RRR interview, 'Smart Arts' - Industrial Estate, January 9th, 11:00am
Dan Rule, 'Factory makes way for fine arts in Heidelberg West factory exhibition Industrial Estate' The Age, Jan 8