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Biography

Lily Hibberd is an interdisciplinary artist and writer working on frontiers of time, memory and the cosmos. Her projects combine performance, writing, painting, photography, sound, moving image and installation art. Developed in collaboration with artists, scientists and historians, the resulting work has been presented in 50 international exhibitions and festivals since 1999. Major art-science projects include "Female Computers" for the 220 Biennale of Sydney, "Data Horizons" for the 2017 Edinburgh Science Festival, and "First Light" for the International Year of Light at the Musée des arts et métiers in 2015. In 2021, Lily began to study the planet Venus and is now developing a collaboration with the Science Museum, London, and diverse international curators, artists scientists to learn from the planet Venus in the lead up to the next ESA-NASA mission in 2031. Lily is a research associate at Université Paris Cité and lecturer at The New School Parsons Paris.

Extended Biography

Australian-born Lily Hibberd’s interdisciplinary art practice spans 25 years. Her early work, between 1997 and 2004, centred on a study of cinematic aesthetics in painting and its extension into installations combining lighting, sound and video. 

In 2004, Lily founded the experimental art writing publication, unMagazine, which she edited until 2008. During this period, Lily also embraced writing as an integral part of her practice, producing texts that featured in numerous performances and sound installations, all pivoting on questions of memory. 

Between 2007–2010, Lily's practice was concerned with marginalised memory, and collaborative and community centred work alongside intensive research and residencies. She also completed a PhD in this period, focused on writing and the voice as boundary conditions. In 2012, Parragirls Memory Project was launched, which Lily supported as a writer and creative producer until 2019. 

Time has been a consistent topic in Lily’s work across different media, featured in 11 painting installations, performance and video projects from 1999 to 2021. The cosmos became a signficant theme in Lily’s work from 2015, leading to numerous collaborations with scientists and historians of astronomy and major exhibitions for the 2015 UNESCO Year of Light, the 2017 Edinburgh Science Festival, and the 2020 Biennale of Sydney. In 2021, Lily began to work in dialogue with the planet Venus and is now developing a collaboration with the Science Museum, London, and diverse international curators, artists scientists to learn from the planet Venus in the lead up to the next ESA-NASA mission in 2031.

Lily is a research associate at Université Paris Cité and lecturer at The New School Parsons Paris.

Curriculum Vitae

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SOLO EXHIBITIONS & MAJOR PROJECTS

2023 Planet Venus: probing, dreaming, knowing, “LASER Paris - Planetary portraits” curated by Annick Bureaud and Carine Le Malet, Cité Internationale des Arts, Paris, France.

2022 Venusian Rover, “Cosmos Archaeology: Explorations in Time and Space”, EPFL Pavilions, Lausanne, Switzerland.

2020 Boundless – out of time, 22nd Biennale of Sydney: NIRIN, with Sydney Observatory and Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences, Sydney.

2020 Displacement, ‘Beyond: Design Futures Festival’, Karlsruhe, Germany.

2020 ‘Phone Booth Project Predux’ with Curtis Taylor, Prototype, Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts, Australia.

2018 Parragirls Past, Present VR/360 3D film, ZKM Centre for Art and New Media, Karlsruhe, Germany.

2017 Data Horizons, 2017 Edinburgh International Science Festival, Summerhall, Scotland.

2017 Parragirls Past, Present immersive film, UNSW EPICentre, Big Anxiety festival commission, Sydney, Australia

2017 Parramatta Girls Home audio walk, with Alex Davies and Parragirls, The Big Anxiety festival, Sydney, Australia.

2015 First Light, Musée des arts et métiers, Paris, France.

2015 β Persei, Galerie de Roussan, Paris, France.

2015 Eclipse [...] diaphane, Galerie de Roussan, Paris, France.

2015 It goes both ways: moving images between different times and places, commissioned for ‘Spaced 2’, Perth International Arts Festival, Western Australian Museum, Australia.

2014 The Phone Booth Project in collaboration with Curtis Taylor, in Les Rencontres Internationales, Gaité Lyrique, Paris, France / Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin, Germany.

2014 Twin Cinema: 4 Devils and a Woman in Red, commissioned for The Cinemas Project, Latrobe Regional Gallery, Victoria, Australia.

2013 Ice Pendulum, Canal Saint Martin, Nuit Blanche festival, Paris, France.

2013 Mémoires Vives: une histoire de l’art aborigène, Musée d’Aquitaine, Bordeaux, France.

2012 Coup de Soleil in ‘Build me a city,’ curator Vivonne Thwaites, commissioned for Adelaide Architecture Biennale, Australian Experimental Art Foundation, Adelaide, Australia.

2012 The Phone Booth Project with Curtis Taylor, commissioned for We Don’t Need a Map, Fremantle Arts Centre, Perth, Australia.

2012 Anti-panopticon, Museum of Freud’s Dreams, St Petersburg, Russia.

2012 The Woman in the Bridge, ArtBAR, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, Australia.

2011 Seeking a Meridian, Galerie de Roussan, Paris, France.

2011 Benevolent Asylum: just for fun with WART, for WALK program Performance Space, Sydney.

2011 Benevolent Asylum: an eclipse of historical fiction, Fremantle Arts Centre, Perth, Australia.

2010 BookBUS, various sites Sydney, P4 (pilot) and Performance Space, Sydney, Australia.

2009 First Love, GRANTPIRRIE, Sydney, Australia.

2009 Deadman Monologue, Canberra Contemporary Art Space, Canberra, Australia.

2008 Bordertown, Artspace, Sydney, Australia.

2008 Endless summer: sunglasses and the spectacle of vision, Australian Experimental Art Foundation, Adelaide, Australia.

2008 Bordertown, Conical Inc, Melbourne, Australia.

2008 Time and Again, Melbourne City Laneways commission, Melbourne, Australia.

2007 The Perfect Future Game, Arc Biennial, QUT Museum, Brisbane, Australia.

2007 Endless summer: sunglasses and the spectacle of vision, Gertrude Contemporary Art Spaces, Melbourne, Australia.

2006 I want to break free, Karen Woodbury Gallery, Melbourne, Australia.

2005 Dangerous Liaisons, Linden Centre for Contemporary Arts, Melbourne, Australia.

2004 Paint Tin Fantasias, The Farm, Brisbane.

2004 SLEEPWALKER: cinema & dreams, Kings Artist-run space, Melbourne, Australia.

2003 Blinded by the Light, Perth Institute of Contemporary Art, Australia.

2003 Blinded by the Light, BUS Galleries, Melbourne, Australia.

2002 Burning Memory, Imperial Slacks, Sydney, Australia.

2001 Burning Memory, TCB inc. ART, Melbourne, Australia.

2000 Time slots, Spencer St Gallery, Melbourne, Australia.

GROUP EXHIBITIONS (highlights)

2022 ‘Parragirls Past, Present’, Creative Media Tools for Mental Health, Australian Centre for the Moving Image (ACMI), Melbourne, Australia.

2019 Politics of Place, curated by Alexander Campos and Monica Oppen, Center for Book Art, NYC, USA.

‘The Phone Booth Project’ with Curtis Taylor, in UNTITLED (UURA), Perth Institute for Contemporary Arts, Australia.

2017 Networking the Unseen, curator Gretta Louw, Villa Merkel, Stuggart, Germany.

2017 The Public Secret, with Bonney Djuric and Jenny McNally, ‘Group Therapy: mental distress in a digital age’, curated by Vanessa Bartlett, commissioned for The Big Anxiety festival, Sydney.

2017 ‘9 X 5 NOW’ curator Elizabeth Gower, VCA, Margaret Lawrence Gallery, Melbourne, Australia.

2016 L’Oeil du collectionneur. Neuf collections particulières strasbourgeoises, Musée d’Art Moderne et Contemporain de Strasbourg, Strasbourg, France.

2016 The Phone Booth Project, with Curtis Taylor, Networking the unseen. Furtherfield, London, UK.

2016 We Don’t Need a Map: A Martu experience of the Western Desert, East Pilbara Arts Centre and Martumili Gallery, Newman, Australia.

2016 Drawing Now, Carreau du Temple, Paris, France.

2016 [ 0°C ], blanClass, Yokohama, Japan.

2015 New Frontiers, Linden New Art, Melbourne, Australia.

2015 Polar Time: a year in six minutes, one sunrise, VOLTA11 Basel, Switzerland.

2015 Seeking a Meridian, ‘Counting Bone’, Affiliated Text, Sydney, Australia.

2015 We Don’t Need a Map: A Martu experience of the Western Desert, regional gallery tour.

2015 Island Salon/Underbelly Arts Festival, Cockatoo Island, Sydney, Australia.

2014 Pixeling: rencontre pour l’art vidéo, Garage Turenne, Paris, France.

2014 Les Rencontres Internationales, Gaité Lyrique, Paris and Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin., Germany.

2013 Ice Pendulum, The Solo Project, MOVING ART, Basel, Switzerland.

2013 Easy Listening, curator Philipa Veitch, West Space, Melbourne, Australia.

2012 I Would Breathe Water, curator Kit Wise, Sarah Scout Presents, Melbourne.

2012 Formal Intensity: Australian Art Today, Tsagaandarium Art gallery, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.

2011 SubText: artists and writing, curator Zara Stanhope, West Space, Melbourne, Australia.

2008 The Leisure Class, curator Kathryn Weir, Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane, Australia.

2008 The last thing I remember, curator Kyla McFarlane, University of Sydney Art Gallery, Australia.

2007 Arc Biennial, QUT Museum, Brisbane, Australia.

2003 Art + Film, Centre for Contemporary Photography, Melbourne, Australia.

2002 Mnemotech, curator Bec Dean, Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts, Perth, Western Australia.

2001 Look See: 5 contemporary painters, curator Natasha Bullock, Monash University Gallery, Australia.

RESIDENCIES & AWARDS (selected)

2023-24 Artist research residency, Science Museum, London, United Kingdom.

2023 Creative Australia (Australia Council for the Arts), Visual Arts project grant.

2020 Artist residency, Sydney Observatory and Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences, Sydney.

2019 UNSW Dean’s Best Creative Work Award for Parragirls Past, Present, 2017.

2016 Leverhulme Trust Fellowship, artist in residence at Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, UK.

2014-15 Artist in residence Musée des arts et métiers and Observatory of Paris, France.

2014 Spaced 2, residency with remote Western Desert Aboriginal communities, Australia.

2013-14 The Cinemas Project/National Exhibitions Touring Scheme regional Victorian artist residency.

2012 TERRA Art Foundation, Summer School visiting professor residency, Giverny, France.

2010-11 Performance Space (Sydney) fellowships and awards to collaboratively develop Benevolent Asylum and BookBUS participatory art projects in communities, Sydney, Australia.

2009 Art Gallery of NSW Paris Cité International des Arts studio residency, Paris, France.

2006 Studio residency, Gertrude Contemporary Art Spaces, Melbourne, Australia.

2000 National Winner, UBS Art Award, Whitechapel Gallery, London, United Kingdom.

1999 Postgraduate Award, National Gallery of Victoria Women’s Association.

EDITORIAL & CURATORIAL ACTIVITIES (highlights)

2022 Assistant producer and writer, Cosmos Archaeology: Explorations in Time and Space, EPFL Pavilions, curated by EPFL Professor Sarah Kenderdine, Lausanne, Switzerland.

2021 Assistant producer and writer, Deep Fakes: Art and Its Double, exhibition at EPFL Pavilions, curated by EPFL Professor Sarah Kenderdine, Lausanne, Switzerland.

2020 Co-editor, with Martine Beugnet, “Absorbed in experience”, dossier in Screen, issue 61(4).

2012-18 Co-founder and creative director of Parramatta Female Factory Precinct Memory Project.

2011 Curator, Unseen Forces, International Contemporary Art Newtown, Sydney, Australia.

2004-09 Founding editor un Magazine.

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Slide Show

Contact

Email

lilyhibberd [insert@] gmail.com