Hanna Tai explores how photography, video, sound and sculpture can be used to make ordinary experience seem unfamiliar. Often using humour, she unpicks her chosen media in order to understand its material and durational properties and to reveal something new about the way we see things. In recent works, she examines the interconnectedness of daily life with bigger, inconceivable things, like climate change.
CV
Contact: hannatai(at)gmail.com
Born Adelaide. Lives and works in Naarm (Melbourne).
Collectives
Founding member of LAST Collective with Katie Lee, Melanie Irwin, Beth Arnold and Clare Rae.
Founding member of the Art/Mums collective with Nina Ross, Gabrielle de Vietri, Tai Snaith, Eugenia Lim, Clare Rae, Jessie Scott, Claudia Phares, Clare Needham and more.
Founding member of CONCRETE POST with David Thomas, Andrew Tetzlaff, Christoph Dalhausen and more.
Academic
2007 Master in Fine Arts, RMIT, Melbourne
2003 MA in Image and Communication (Photography) Goldsmiths College, London
1998 Bachelor of Design Studies (Architecture) University of Adelaide
Solo Exhibitions
2021 Passing, project for the Kyneton Contemporary Art Triennial (in the lead-up to the KCAT 2022 group event), Kyneton Scout Hall & Campaspe (Boregam) River Walk, Kyneton
2020 THIS COULD WORK!/I’M SCARED, Bundoora Homestead Art Centre, Melbourne
2019 A Device to Save Us All, Monfai Cultural Centre, Chiang Mai
2018 Not not not not (Invisible Substance), School House Studios Pole Space, Melbourne
2014 Massive Problems, VCA Margaret Lawrence Gallery, Melbourne
2014 Come to Me, Centre for Contemporary Photography, Melbourne
2013 Pictures, Rae & Bennett Fine Art Gallery + Printers, Melbourne
2012 Vertigo, or no return, Studio 12, Gertrude Contemporary, Melbourne
2012 At the outpost, beside the rapids, BLINDSIDE Gallery, Melbourne
2011 Looking for Nothing, Dianne Tanzer Gallery + Projects, Melbourne
2010 Trees in Space: The Reorder of Things, Centre for Contemporary Photography, Melbourne
2009 The Venus Canals, West Space, Melbourne
2007 Creating a Theory of Everything, First Site Gallery, Melbourne
Group & Collaborative Exhibitions
2023 SPACE with the LAST Collective, as part of Collective Polyphony, Mary Cherry Gallery, Melbourne
2022 Kyneton Contemporary Art Triennial, Kyneton
2019 Perceiving The Matter Of Time In Recent Painting And Photography, Five Walls, Melbourne
2018 State of the Union (with the Artists Subcommittee), Ian Potter Museum of Art, Melbourne
2018 Cinema, Kudos Gallery, Sydney
2018 Framing Nature, McClelland Sculpture Park + Gallery, Melbourne
2017 LIGHT: The Second LAST Collective Show, Artery Project Space, Melbourne
2017 Barbara Beckmann: Resources & Hanna Tai: Invisible Substance, CLOUD at Danslab, The Hague
2017 HEAT: Solar Revolutions, Te Uru Waitakere Contemporary Gallery, Auckland
2016 The First LAST Collective Show, 87 Albert St, Brunswick East (studio complex)
2016 Redlands Konica Minolta Art Prize, NAS Gallery, Sydney
2016 MUM, Stockroom Gallery, Kyneton
2015 Cutting Mirrors, C3 contemporary art space, Melbourne
2015 CONCRETE POST 3, raum2810, Bonn, Germany
2015 CONCRETE POST 2, RMIT Project Space, Melbourne
2014 Elephant in the Room, Brenda May Gallery, Sydney
2014 Situation, RMIT Design Hub, Melbourne
2014 The Substation Contemporary Art Prize, The Substation, Melbourne
2014 Composing Common Worlds, Town Hall Gallery, Melbourne
2013-2014 Melbourne Now, National Gallery of Victoria
2013 Gertrude Studios Exhibition, Gertrude Contemporary, Melbourne
2013 Decisions: RMIT Print Practices Residency Exhibition, RMIT Project Space, Melbourne
2013 Sub12, The Substation, Melbourne
2013 WITHIN, Greenwood St Projects, Melbourne
2013 Standing, Walking, Sitting, Driving, Lying, Ozlyn Gallery, Auckland
2012 Gertrude Studios Exhibition, Gertrude Contemporary, Melbourne
2012 Where the birds always sing, Ausin Tung Gallery, Australia China Art Foundation, Melbourne
2012 Lux 0.27, Dark Horse Experiment, Melbourne
2011 Gertrude Studios Exhibition, Gertrude Contemporary, Melbourne
2011 Reason and Rhyme (Part 2), St Paul St Gallery, Auckland
2011 Reason and Rhyme (Part 1), Gertrude Contemporary, Melbourne
2011 Holding on, looking down (with Kiron Robinson), Light Projects, Melbourne
2010 Experiments on Plant Hybridization, Dianne Tanzer Gallery + Projects, Melbourne
2009 Josephine Ulrick & Win Schubert Photography Award, Gold Coast City Art Gallery
2008 Connect: It’s Alright. It’s Magic. (Curated by Darren Sylvester) Kings ARI, Melbourne
2008 Unbundled Together (with composer Tristan Coleman) Bus Gallery, Melbourne
2008 Octopus 8: The softness in the rock: hope in disappointing times, (Curated by Emily Cormack),
Gertrude Contemporary Art Spaces, Melbourne
2007 RMIT MFA Graduate Show, Gossard Studios, RMIT, Melbourne
2005 All These Things, Immanuelkirchstr.10, Berlin
2004 Performance with Mathew Sawyer, 7a* 11d* International Performing Arts Festival, Toronto
2003 Response/ability, Oxo Tower Bargehouse, London
Video Screenings
2015 Implicit Spectatorship, Athens Digital Arts Festival, Athens, Greece
2014 Videoholica International Festival of Video Art, Varna, Bulgaria
Residencies
2019 Artist in Residence, Ne'-Na Contemporary Art Space, Chiang Mai
2018 Art/Mums collective residency, Norma Redpath House, as part of Doing Feminism / Sharing the World, curated by Anne Marsh
2017 Artist in Residence, Satellietgroep DCR Guest Studios, The Hague
2013 Print Practices Residency, RMIT, Melbourne
2011-2013 Gertrude Contemporary Studio Artist, Melbourne
2012 Artist in Residence, Sanskriti, Delhi
2010 Artist in Residence, Arteles, Finland
Grants
2021 Australia Council Arts Projects Grant
2021 Creative Victoria Creative Workers Fund
2019 Australia Council Development Grant
2017 Australia Council Development Grant
2012 Arts Victoria Arts Development Grant
2012 Australia Council New Work Grant
2010 Australia Council ArtStart Grant
2009 Australia Council New Work Grant
Teaching
2018 - 2019 Fine Art Lecturer, Deakin University, Melbourne
2015 - 2016 Fine Art Lecturer, RMIT University, Melbourne
2013 - 2014 Photography Tutor, Deakin University, Melbourne
2012 - 2013 Photography Tutor, Rotary Youth Arts Project, Centre for Contemporary Photography, Melbourne
2010 – 2011 Photography Lecturer, RMIT University School of Architecture and Design, Melbourne
2009 – 2014 Photography Tutor, Centre for Adult Education, Melbourne
Bibliography
Cormack, Emily, ‘Nothing in time’, Reason and Rhyme publication, Melbourne: Gertrude Contemporary, 2011.
Cormack, Emily, 'Octopus 8: The softness in the rock: hope in disappointing times', catalogue essay, Melbourne: Gertrude Contemporary Artists Spaces, 2008.
Finch, Maggie, ‘Trees in Space: The Reorder of Things’, catalogue essay, Melbourne: Centre for Contemporary Photography, 2010.
Harmon, Steph, 'Bob Dylan, high fashion and 'human folly': 30 years of Melbourne photography', review, The Guardian, 21 July 2016.
Homewood, David, 'Vertigo, or no return', Gertrude Contemporary and Art & Australia Emerging Writers Program, 2012.
McFarlane, Kyla, ‘Critic’s Choice’, Art Collector, Issue 68, April-June 2014.
Nelson, Robert, ‘A true heart of stone’, review, The Age, 24 Feb 2010.
Palmer, Stephen, ‘Hanna Tai & Kiron Robinson: Holding on, looking down’, essay, Melbourne: Light Projects, 2011.
Rule, Dan, 'In the galleries: Composing Common Worlds', review, The Age, 6 Sept 2014.
Sylvester, Darren, ‘Connect: It’s Alright. It’s Magic.’, catalogue essay, Melbourne: Kings Artist-run Initiative, 2008.
Tutton, Sarah, ‘Octopus 8: The softness in the rock: hope in disappointing times', review, Art Asia Pacific, Issue 61 Nov/Dec 2008.
Thomas, David, ‘A mid point in Reason and Rhyme or how two Swiss artists can assist us in considering the world through an exhibition’, Reason and Rhyme publication, Melbourne: Gertrude Contemporary, 2011.
Wallis, Pip, ‘Gertrude Studios 2011’, catalogue essay, Melbourne: Gertrude Contemporary, 2011.
Collections
National Gallery of Victoria
City of Melbourne
RMIT University
Private collections