We acknowledge and pay respect to the Traditional Owners of the lands upon which our campus is situated, the people of the Boon Wurrung and Woi Wurrung, who have created art, made music and told their stories here for thousands of generations. We also acknowledge and extend our respect to the Traditional Owners of all lands on which our work is viewed, shared and enjoyed, and to all Elders, past, present and emerging.

VCA Art 2023

Bachelor of Fine Arts (Painting)

Through a labour of haptic repetition, I reflect on the interplay between land and body. I see the body as a vessel for ancestral pasts and interconnected histories.

Remembering the country I left, and the place where I now stand, a part of my identity is imprinted onto these sculptures.

Using materials from the earth, I listen to the stories they quietly hold and it feels like a ghost in my hands.

I’m shaping the clay and I picture a body (flesh, skin, bones) and a body (swarm, flock, herd).

I’m tying knots to connect the past with present, trying to find a sense of continuity and community within the larger human-environmental whole.

Bahji (Vi) Nguyen

 Image Courtesy the University of Melbourne.