The Barossa Women’s Artist Residency Project, driven by The Barossa Council and the Barossa Regional Gallery, aims to provide established female artists an opportunity to experiment and grow their practice within the environs of the Barossa region, creating work in the context of and in response to “place”.

This initiative, in three rounds across 2023, 2024 and 2025, is an annual international artist residency program specifically targeting mid-career and established female artists of any discipline.

With its own unique identity, the project is the first of its kind in the Barossa Valley and quickly garnered support from both people within the local art scene and a myriad of industries. Generously funded by community donations and supported by The Barossa Council, the program provides an opportunity rarely offered exclusively to female artists and aims to raise the profile of female artists and increase the likelihood of them developing long and sustained careers.

Expression of interest for the program was opened earlier this year to both Australian and international artists across all artforms.

The Residency was first developed early in 2023 and successfully hosted Melbourne landscape artist Belinda Wilson across 5 weeks in November and December is the inaugural resident. During her time in the region, Belinda delivered four public engagement outcomes, free to the community, including an Art History lecture, an En Plein Air art session at the Barossa Bushgardens, a Live Art Demonstration and an Artist Talk, reflecting on the Residency.

“The Barossa Women’s Artist Residency program stands as a model for successful arts initiatives,” reflected Ms. Wilson upon her time in the Barossa, “demonstrating the positive impact that focused, collaborative, and community-driven efforts can have on both artists and the regions they inhabit. By continuing to build on these successes the program is poised to sustain its positive influence, fostering a vibrant and enduring legacy in the Barossa arts and culture scene.”

“This residency provides yet another opportunity to reflect on our rich cultural heritage and the place we call home,” Mayor Lange said. “We look forward to creating ongoing artistic opportunities that reinforce the Barossa as a premier arts and cultural destination.”

Murray’s paintings tend to be about the experiences of women often depicting women in a scene, and the hidden thoughts and psychologies of the situations in which they find themselves.

“The opportunity to engage with the area of Barossa through my work is really exciting for me – much of my work is about personal connections with particular places,” said Ms Murray.

“The outsider’s perspective is a different way of encountering a place to someone who sees it changing year to year and decade to decade. A temporary, immediate vividness, bereft of the understanding that comes with familiarity. I would use this residency to develop new work around this aspect of personal encounters with settings, and further explore the human partiality we bring to such moments.”

“I love the process of staying and looking, and bringing things back to the studio and finding meaning.”

“As a figurative painter, external influences form a large part of my inspiration; my experiences on previous artist residencies have affected and inspired me in different ways – leading to unexpected points of departure. The preparatory stages of my paintings involve a lot of experimentation. I stage and direct the scenes from which I work using the materials and locations around me.”

“I have never been to Australia, so I am excited to see how the particular character of these antipodean landscapes might similarly impact my sensibilities.”

“I have never been to Australia, so I am excited to see how the particular character of these antipodean landscapes might similarly impact my sensibilities.”