About

Aldona Kmieć is an interdisciplinary Polish-Australian artist whose work explores memory, migration, and belonging through contemporary photographic media. Combining photography, cyanotype, and archival photographs, her practice draws on personal and collective histories shaped by migration and belonging.

Born in Poland and based in Naarm/Melbourne, Aldona has over two decades of experience as an artist, educator, and workshop facilitator. She holds an Advanced Diploma in Photography from London Metropolitan University, where she received the Graduation Show Award. Since migrating to Australia in 2009, she has developed a socially engaged practice working with communities and cultural institutions across regional and metropolitan contexts.

Her work has been exhibited widely and is held in public, institutional, and private collections including the State Library of Victoria (Rural and Regional Commission photographic series, 2020–2023), St John of God Hospitals, Ballarat Arts Foundation, the former Museum of Australian Democracy at Eureka (M.A.D.E.), and the Ruah Centre for Women and Children, as well as private collections in Australia and internationally.

Recent projects include r.a.g.e. random acts of gentle expression (2026), Hills Hoist (2025), Veil (2024), Neighbourhood Watch (2024), and Winterbloom (2021). Her work has been recognised through major awards and prizes including the Mullins Conceptual Photography Prize, Omnia Art Prize, Bowness Photography Prize, and the Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize (UK), and regularly features across platforms including Head On Photo Awards, Ballarat International Foto Biennale, M-ARTLENS, podcasts and The Design Files.

Alongside her studio practice, Aldona leads workshops and offers mentoring to emerging and established artists, focusing on exhibition development, marketing, and professional practice.

Aldona works from Montsalvat Artist Studio, 7 Hillcrest Avenue, Eltham.

Melbourne Photographer Aldona Kmiec artist
Artist Aldona Kmieć at her Soldiers Hill studio Photo: Eve Wilson for TDF The Design Files Australia 2015

The artist acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the land on which she lives and works, and pays her respects to their Elders, past, present, and emerging.

 


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