11 November 2022

Sunshine Coast Arts Foundation’s Gifted program will support nine diverse artist projects in 2023 including new ceramic, sculpture, watercolour, photographic, street art and dance artworks, a PhD mentorship, and a pilot film for a series of live music performances.

Seven of the projects are supported by Gifted Program Patrons, who have nominated the arts medium or practice that inspires them as an investment into the recipient’s creative journey.

Foundation Chair Professor Jennifer Radbourne announced the Patrons and nine diverse projects at a special event at the studio of local artist Tory Richards at Moffatt Beach on Friday, 11 November 2022.

She is pictured at the announcement event with Patrons and Recipients (from left) Finn Cossar, Ferre and Mieke De Deyne, Mira Chorik, Jane Anderson, Amanda Bennetts, Annie Boyd, Fiona Harding, Richard Hyett, Gail Hunter, Alison Mooney, Keith and Karen Neuendorf, Shannon Garson.

“SCAF’s Gifted campaign links local gifted artists with a gift from a donor,” Professor Radbourne said.

“We use ‘gifted’ in association with painters, writers, actors, musicians, sculptors, potters, singers and dancers, to create an image of someone who is talented and has exceptional ability.

“Then we use the word ‘gift’ to describe something we give willingly as a present to surprise or celebrate.

“I am proud to say that this year we have increased the number of gifts we offer and thus more recipient artists,” she said.

The Patrons and artist projects are listed below.

• Jane Anderson (Noosaville) will lead a collaborative multi-disciplinary team of early-career artists to undertake The Dancer Project as part of a site-specific body of experimental work during their Project 24 residency at 2nd Space in Nambour.
• Supported by Patrons Don and Annie Boyd, Amanda Bennetts, Pomona will undertake a residency at 2nd Space Nambour, as part of the Project 24 program, exploring the medicalised body through installation, photography and video art to develop a new body of work for exhibition. She will collaborate with a local scientist or radiographer using medical imagery such as CAT, MRI or PET scanning, to continue her explorations of the experimental intersection of art and science.
• Supported by Patron Herb Fenn, Dancelab director Michelle Bucci, Woombye will choreograph and develop Bound, a collaborative contemporary dance work centred around the concept of manipulation and restrictions, with three emerging dancers who have returned after studying abroad.
• Performing artist, award-winning songwriter and independent producer Mira Chorik, Maleny plans to undertake professional development mentoring sessions with Dr Kellie O’Dempsey from the University of the Sunshine Coast to develop her PhD proposal in creative arts.
• Supported by Patrons the De Deyne Family, Finn Cossar, Burnside, will create quality sculptural works for the Sunshine Coast region.
• Supported by Patrons Karen and Keith Neuendorf, Shannon Garson, Maleny, plans to expand a 2020 body of work which explored the Tasmanian coastline and the disappearing kelp forest of the Southern Ocean. She will develop a library of material which can be taken back to her Maleny studio and used to create, porcelain pots, drawings and watercolours.
• Supported by Patrons Jan and Jeff Cornfoot, emerging artist (painter and poet) Fiona Harding, Nambour, who works under the name ‘spirit you’, will create a new body of work, gold beneath, which she hopes to exhibit.
• Supported by Patron Jocelyn Walker, singer-songwriter Andrea Kirwin (Nambour) plans to film and record the pilot for a music concert series, called Peace Run TV, to promote to music lovers globally and put Nambour on the map as a live music destination.
• Supported by Patron Gail Hunter, Alison Mooney, Coolum, will develop The Sketch Wall, a publicly situated wall which she will repaint seasonally in collaboration with other artists.

A new promotional video produced by three University of the Sunshine Coast students, Caleb Stevens, Viola Pink and Lisa Sandberg, was screened for the first time at the event.

In the first two years since its launch in November 2020 the Gifted program has supported 14 local artist projects.

Donations can be made to the Gifted Annual Giving campaign at scartsfoundation.comsupport.