Clare McCracken

Clare McCracken is a mixed-media artist and writer working in Naarm/Melbourne with Scottish, Danish and Irish heritage. Originally from Waywurru Country, Clare grew up on a remote property in the foothills of Victoria’s alpine region. She works site-responsively, across disciplines and collaboratively with other artists to create works that interrogate environmental, technological and feminist pasts, presents and possible futures. Clare’s creative outcomes include performative fieldwork, large-scale immersive installations, temporary and permanent public artworks and narrative non-fiction written works. Methodologically shaped by her rural upbringing, walking, foraging, storytelling, and driving remain integral to her practice, along with an interest in working with and creating work for non-traditional art going publics.

Clare has created over 30 temporary public artworks for sites across Melbourne, Hobart and Sydney - including Federation Square and Cockatoo Island and exhibited locally and internationally including at the 2019 Bienal de la Habana, Cuba and as part of WORD OF MOUTH, a Venice Biennale pop-up curated by Peter Hill. Clare has been shortlisted for the Nillumbik Art Prize, the Darebin Art Prize, the Wangaratta Contemporary Textile Award and the Hardie Grant Spark Prize for Narrative Nonfiction Writing. Her work is in private collections, the State Library of Victoria’s rare book collection, the Wangaratta Art Gallery, City of Hume and City of Greater Dandenong collections.

In 2020 Clare completed her PhD at RMIT University.  As the recipient of the prestigious Vice Chancellors scholarship her practice-led research sat at the intersection of art, cultural geography and urban theory. She employed innovative performance methods to research how mobility systems (cars and ships) coproduce space, place and landscape across generations in Australia. In 2019 she won an RMIT University Research Award in the Higher Degree by Research – Impact Category. 

CV available on request - clare@mccracken.com.au