Photo by Nicole Reed 2026
Melanie is a contemporary artist, muralist and curator, having graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Art (Painting) from RMIT and holds a Masters of Arts Management.
Over the last fifteen years she has developed her creative practice to incorporate finely detailed oil paintings and large-scale exterior public works. Examining our relationship with the world around us and with a focus on immortalising a sense of place, she uses flora, colour and avian species to draw attention to the fragility and vibrancy of our landscape. Balancing detail with expansiveness, her artworks introduce moments of softness and surprise within urban environments, weaving together storytelling, symbolism, and subtle mythologies that evoke deeper internal narratives.
Melanie has been commissioned to create public artworks in dozens of locations across Victoria, NSW and SA, working with local government bodies, commercial and corporate clients and private commissions.
She has been curated into group exhibitions and has staged solo exhibitions around Melbourne and in Gippsland, including a major solo exhibition in 2015 at the Latrobe Regional Gallery as the recipient of the annual Dick Bishop Memorial Award. She was also a participating artist as part of Outrè Gallery’s annual exhibition LOCALS in 2026.
In 2022 - 2023 Melanie completed a major commission with Rail Projects Victoria and Regional Rail Revival to create fabricated artworks at the new Bunyip and Longwarry railway stations, as well as a large site specific mural for the Victorian Big Battery and Tesla in Moorabool.
Melanie established Arts Eleven Projects, an arts management and curatorial company, in 2019. Arts Eleven Projects has managed a number of significant arts projects for clients including Gippsland Art Gallery, St Vincent’s Hospital, Moonee Valley City Council and Western Health. In 2021 she was the project manager for the Victorian showing of the Archibald Prize.
Melanie was a finalist in the 2024 Percival Portrait Prize, a finalist in the 2022 and the 2019 KAAF Art Prize, the 2026, 2024 and 2023 Omnia Art Prize and the Winner of the 2016 People’s Choice Award in the Roi Art Prize. She has also been a selected mural artist for Frankston’s Big Picture Festival in 2021 and 2022, Urban Canvas Mural Festival in Melbourne 2023 and Benalla Street Art Festival 2024.
While Melanie is based between Melbourne/Naarm and South Gippsland, she can generally be found wherever her latest mural takes her.
