Starting this year, we have invited an emerging national artist with local or regional roots to hold a solo show in parallel with the curated Kangaroo Valley Art Prize & Exhibition. We are excited to announce that our 2018 Featured Artist will be the two-time Archibald finalist (2017, 2018) Vanessa Stockard of Bowral, NSW.

Born in Sydney and growing up in a small NSW mid-north coast country town, Vanessa is a contemporary artist who has been painting for over 20 years. She attended the Julian Ashton Art School, the North Sydney Art School and received her BFA from UNSW College of Fine Arts.

Vanessa has had close to 20 solo shows in Australia and the USA, and been in many group shows in Sydney, Melbourne, Hong Kong, New York, Berkeley and Portland in the USA, and throughout regional NSW. She has won many prestigious prizes including Highly Commended, Goulburn Regional Gallery, 2013; 2017 Finalist, Portia Geach Memorial Award, Australia's most prestigious art prize for portraiture by women artists; and repeat Finalist, Archibald Prize, 2017 & 2018.

As noted recently by one commentator, “The deceptive everyday nature of her subject matter belies hidden depths of relationship, feeling and emotion. One could describe her process as absence of thought, a freedom of construct, not unlike the stream of consciousness associated with authors such as Hemmingway and Thomas Wolfe.”

Vanessa has recently accepted a residency at Chateau Orquevaux, France, and will therefore be unable to be with us in person. A professional videographer has produced an interview of her talking about her work. It will run continuously as part of her solo show.