Led by curiosity and shaped by lived experience, CREATING SPACE reveals how making art can become an act of survival, defiance, and self-care.
Step into a space where creative practice holds pain, power, and possibility – where healing isn’t a metaphor, it’s a method.
Essential Making
CREATING SPACE is an exhibition grounded in the belief that creativity is not just expressive – it’s essential.
Made by professional artists who live with, or are carers of, chronic health conditions, neurological, immune, neurodivergence, trauma, and disability, the show highlights how art becomes a method of self-agency, nervous system care, and meaning-making. Here, the act of making is both deeply personal and politically charged – a form of survival, a tool of recovery, and a way to reconnect with self and community.
The Process
Rather than illustrating healing as a finished story, CREATING SPACE centres the process itself – slow, ongoing, often imperfect – led by curiosity, not clinical timelines.
It honours the many roles art plays in health: from emotional regulation and neurorehabilitation to cultural identity and spiritual connection. The exhibition also invites viewers to reflect, respond, and begin creative practices of their own – at home, in the gallery, or in quiet moments between.
Artists
Amanda Alderson,
SICK AF curator, artist jeweller, storyteller (WA, Australia)
Christina Baltais,
visual artist, advocate (Toronto, Canada)
Nadeen Brown,
multidisciplinary artist, advocate (SA, Australia)
Claire B. Bushby,
multidisciplinary artist, curator (WA, Australia)
Brad Coleman,
artist, creative, storyteller (WA, Australia)
Lucinda Crimson,
visual artist, advocate (WA, Australia)
Ana Fuentes,
graphic designer, educator, creative coach (California, USA)
Catherine Higham,
contemporary artist ( regional WA, Australia)
Jacqui Monks,
video artist, writer (WA, Australia)
Shayne O’Donnell,
artist (VIC/WA, Australia)
Annamaria Weldon,
writer, poet, photographer (WA, Australia)