Torika Bolatagici

Dr Torika Bolatagici is a multidisciplinary artist whose work has been exhibited extensively across Oceania and internationally since the early 2000s. Her practice engages with Pacific diasporic identity, decolonisation, and cultural memory through expanded lens and screen practices and community-engaged creative methodologies.

Bolatagici's work has been featured in major institutions including the 7th Asia Pacific Triennial at Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art (2012) and the 9th TarraWarra Biennial (2023). She has presented solo exhibitions at venues such as C3 Contemporary Art Space, Melbourne (2018), Kudos Gallery, Sydney (2016), and BUS Gallery (2009), interrogating themes of Indigenous bodies, war economies, and Pacific cultural politics.

Her work has been included in significant group exhibitions spanning over two decades, from early presentations at Asia Pacific Cultural Center, Oakland and Somarts Gallery, San Francisco (2001) and Macy Gallery, New York (2002), to more recent exhibitions at Campbelltown Arts Centre (2013), Indonesia Contemporary Art Network, Yogyakarta (2014), Blak Dot Gallery, Melbourne (2014), Caboolture Regional Art Gallery (2015-16), Taiwan (2017-18), Aotearoa New Zealand (2018), Southeast Museum of Photography, Florida (2020), Walker Art Center, Minneapolis (2024), and Lawrence Wilson Art Gallery, University of Western Australia (2025).

As a curator, Bolatagici has championed voices from Pacific and diaspora communities, demonstrating a sustained commitment to decentring dominant narratives within contemporary art discourse. She curated Volume: Bodies of Knowledge at Counihan Gallery (2023) and Metro Arts (2022), bringing together artists exploring embodied knowledge, cultural memory, and transnational feminist perspectives. Her curatorial practice reflects a rigorous engagement with creating institutional platforms for underrepresented and marginalised communities.

Central to Bolatagici's practice is the Community Reading Room, an ongoing participatory project that has been presented at multiple venues since 2013, including Colour Box Studio (2013), Footscray Community Arts Centre (2014), Arts House (2017), Testing Grounds (2017, 2019), Metro Arts (2022), Centre for Contemporary Photography (2023), Counihan Gallery (2023), MADA Gallery (2024), and Lawrence Wilson Art Gallery (2025). The project has also engaged with public programming through the Emerging Writers Festival (2017, 2019), MPavilion (2021), and RISING: Melbourne (2023). With each iteration, Bolatagici partners with artists and collectives working outside formal institutional frameworks to create counterspaces for critical dialogue and alternative modes of creative practice and presentation. The Community Reading Room aims to establish life-affirming spaces where global majority communities can engage in contemplation and conversation without the institutional gaze, centring creative practices and art writing that exist outside the Western canon.

Bolatagici's practice has been supported by numerous competitive grants and awards, including multiple Creative Australia grants (formerly Australia Council for the Arts) spanning early career development (2010, 2012), community partnerships (2014), and arts projects (2018, 2021). She was awarded the Carstairs Prize by the National Association of Visual Arts in 2018 for socially engaged art practice, and a Creative Victoria VicArts Grant in 2018 for The Community Reading Room presents Black Tourmaline. Her research has been supported through an Australian Research Council Special Research Initiative examining literary practices in regional Australia (2020), and most recently through Creative Australia's International Engagement Fund (2024) for Outside the Classroom: Art & Collectivism in Australia and Indonesia. She has undertaken significant residencies including Fresh Milk Art Platform in Barbados (2016), Yarra City Arts' Room to Create program at Collingwood Yards (2022-23), and the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery's Jayne Wilson Bequest Bursary (2022), where she collaborated on decolonising Pacific collections.