Bio

Aldona Kmieć is a Polish-Australian visual artist and educator based in Melbourne, working across photography, printmaking, installation, and archival practice. With over 20 years of experience, she combines digital and analogue photography, cyanotype, and documentary approaches to explore belonging, memory, migration, and identity, particularly within the Polish diaspora in Australia. Her practice bridges conceptual and socially engaged methods, examining how personal and collective histories are formed, remembered, and reimagined.

Aldona completed an Advanced Diploma in Photography at London Metropolitan University in 2008, and Cert IV TAE40122 at RMIT in 2025. After migrating to Australia in 2009, she developed her professional practice in Ballarat and later Melbourne. She has received grants, commissions, and focused residencies from the City of Melbourne Arts Grant, Gasworks Arts Park, and Trocadero Projects. Solo exhibitions include Hills Hoist (2025), Veil (2024), and Winterbloom (2021), alongside documentary commissions for State Library Victoria.

Aldona maintains a studio at Montsalvat Arts Centre, Eltham, where she teaches analogue cyanotype workshops. Her work is held in national and international collections and has been recognised in prizes including the Bowness Photography Prize (1014), Omnia Art Prize (2025), and Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize (longlisted, UK, 2024).

Alongside her studio work, Aldona is an experienced marketing and project management specialist, available for projects (linkedin.com/in/aldonakmiec) supporting cultural organisations, and community initiatives.

Artist Statement

Photography has been a constant thread throughout my life, shaped by the environment of my childhood and the experiences that followed. Growing up in a small village in Poland during the fall of communism, I witnessed a community strong in resilience. Our family, like many others, carried the scars of WWII. These early years taught me to find beauty in everyday moments and to appreciate the power of storytelling.

Through my photography, I seek to capture the fleeting magic of childhood, the echoes of untold stories, and memories of fear and wonder that shaped my early years. I am drawn to the symbolism found in mundane details and the narratives they carry. Whether through portraits, landscapes, or installations, my work is a reflection of life’s impermanence and the connection between memory and place.

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