TARRAWARRA.- Nina Miall, Sydney-based independent curator and writer, has been appointed as the curator for TarraWarra Museum of Art’s TarraWarra Biennial 2020, opening in August 2020.

TarraWarra Museum of Art Director, Victoria Lynn, said the appointment of Miall to curate the TarraWarra Biennial 2020 is an expression of the Museum’s commitment to ‘art as a world-making activity’.

‘Nina Miall is one of the most respected curators in Australia and has curated numerous exhibitions throughout Europe, the US, Asia and Australia. The wealth of her experience speaks to TarraWarra Museum of Art’s desire to present Australian art in a global context,’ Ms Lynn said.

Miall was most recently Curator at Carriageworks, Sydney (2012–2017), where she co-curated the inaugural multi-venue biennial exhibition The National 2017: New Australian Art, which sought to address the legacies of colonialism, the question of sovereignty, and the ways in which the concept of the nation-state is queried by contemporary art.

Also at Carriageworks, Miall curated the major interdisciplinary project 24 Frames Per Second (2012–2015) which commissioned innovative works situated at the nexus of art, dance and film by Australian and international artists working at the forefront of experimental multi-arts practice.

Miall has an enduring curatorial engagement with research-driven and interdisciplinary practices, with a particular focus on socially engaged and situational art and the relationship between body, site and space.

‘Nina Miall’s unique vision for the 8th iteration of the TarraWarra Biennial will produce a remarkable exhibition experience. Undoubtedly, Miall will test the biennial format whilst observing TarraWarra’s commitment to art, place and ideas,’ Ms Lynn said.

Established in 2006 as a platform for identifying new contemporary and cutting-edge work, the TarraWarra Biennial has become a major forum for artistic expression in Australia. Each Biennial has developed a distinctive curatorial approach, focusing on a particular set of ideas or themes that are prevalent in contemporary art.

The TarraWarra Biennial alternates annually with the TarraWarra International and the current TarraWarra International 2019: The Tangible Trace, explores the notion of a trace as a residue or marker of a place, situation or body of knowledge.

The Tangible Trace includes the works of Francis Alÿs (Belgium/Mexico), Carlos Capelán (Uruguay/Sweden), Simryn Gill (Singapore/Malaysia/Australia), Shilpa Gupta (India), Hiwa K (Iraq/Germany) and Sangeeta Sandrasegar (Australia), including the newly commissioned works by Capelán, Gupta and Sandrasegar which are currently on exhibition at TarraWarra Museum of Art, 313 Healesville-Yarra Glen Road, Healesville. Victoria until 1 September 2019.

Nina Miall is an independent curator and writer based in Sydney. Primary among her curatorial concerns are socially engaged, relational and site-specific practices, and the politics and poetics of performance.

Nina has curated more than 30 exhibitions across Europe, the US, Asia and Australia. Most recently she was Curator at Carriageworks (2012–2017) where she co-curated the inaugural multi-venue biennial exhibition The National 2017: New Australian Art and the major interdisciplinary commissioning project 24 Frames Per Second (2012–2015). Other exhibitions include 1917: The Great Strike, Nick Cave: HEARD.SYD (2016) with the City of Sydney, Francesco Clemente: Encampment (2016), Ross Manning: Melody Lines (2016), and One Year Performance: 1980-1981, by Taiwanese performance artist Tehching Hsieh (2014).

Prior to Carriageworks, Nina was based in London for 12 years where she was a director of contemporary art gallery Haunch of Venison from 2006–2011, curating exhibitions with artists such as Philippe Parreno, Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, and Jitish Kallat, as well as surveys of contemporary South African art and Soviet Non-Conformist art. From 2003–2005, Nina was Head of Public Programmes for the Royal Academy of Arts in London, working with artists such as David Hockney, Ed Ruscha, Jeff Koons, and Frank Auerbach.

From 2012–2015, Nina was a director of Future Perfect, a commercial gallery in Singapore which worked with artists from south-east Asia and beyond. Future Perfect won the prize for ‘Best Gallery Supporting Emerging Contemporary Asian Art’ at the Prudential Eye Awards in 2015. Two of the gallery’s artists – Arin Rungjang from Thailand, and Charles Lim from Singapore – represented their countries at the Venice Biennale in 2013 and 2015 respectively.

In 2017–2018 Nina completed the Australia Council’s Arts Leaders Program. Nina has a BA (Hons I) from the University of Sydney and an MA from the Courtauld Institute of Art, London. She has lectured on contemporary art in Australia and the UK and has published widely.