Dean’s Award for Excellence in Bachelor of Arts (Fine Art) (Honours).
Travel Scholarship Award.
Ballarat International Foto Biennale GradFoto 2024 finalist.
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Substantial and Significant is a multimedia installation, involving a combination of performance, projection and sculpture made from found materials associated with the domestic. The work addresses the complexities of family separation and the Family Court system. For this work the term ‘substantial and significant time’ has a double meaning, indicating the labour of care disproportionately done by women past and present as well as a term used in family law.
My creative practice takes place between the home and the studio, as a necessity shaped by my dual role as both a mother and artist. I subvert everyday domestic actions and household items as materials such as dish racks, chairs and broken crockery as well as craft items associated with the care of my daughter. This practice enables me to find creativity in the everyday. I aim to bring attention to systems perpetuating gendered power imbalance, causing ecological harm and social issues such as violence against women.
From my career in circus arts, balance is an important part of my making process. I use body movement and balance to physically express ideas. When objects and/or a performance artist become contingent on each other, balance can become uneven and precarious. Stacking and assembling objects, reflects the mental and physical precarity of things being contingent on each other for survival.
Mei Wah Williams is a multi-disciplinary artist based in Naarm/Melbourne, with a career in circus performance spanning over 20 years. She specialises in aerial artistry, leading to a life devoted to performance art and physical theatre. Some performing highlights from her career include, directing a solo show, international touring with Strange Fruit, performing on stage with Opera Australia and down walls with Legs on the Wall, Melaka Art and Performance Festival, workshops with Pina Bausch dancers in Berlin, Arts Residency in Patagonia and parading with Empress Stilt Dance for Chinese New Year in Hong Kong. Currently, Mei Wah works as a stilt performer, circus trainer, and a health assistant helping children to achieve speech goals through art play.
