William Kelly & Benjamen Malcom Mckeown

Australia

Title: Journey and Destinations

Article 3: Right to Life, Liberty & Personal

William Kelly is a painter and former Dean of the School of Art of the Victoria College of the Arts. He is also a former steelworker, builder, taxi driver and graduate of the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, USA, and recipient of a Fulbright Fellowship, which brought him to the National Gallery School in Melbourne. He has had one person exhibitions in Melbourne, Italy, New York, Sydney, Germany as well as group and project exhibitions in Japan, Sweden, Korea, Italy, Australia and many other countries.

William Kelly has been a guest lecturer at Yale University and the Philadelphia Prison System. Besides his studio work, he works in the areas of public art and theatre design. His has published articles in major magazines and periodicals in Sydney, New York and London. He has earned the distinction of being the only visual artist to receive an Australian Violence Prevention Award from the Prime Minister.

Born in 1976, Benjamen Malcolm McKeown is an Australian aboriginal artist who belongs to the Wirangu language group in South Australia. He has participated in a number of community art projects, mostly mural paintings and performances. Currently, he is employed as an art lecturer at the Centre for Australian Indigenous Studies at Monash University in Clayton. His work has been exhibited in various art exhibitions in Australia and in 1997 he won the Mary Mollaghan Memorial Prize for Best Aboriginal Exhibit.

Benjamen’s most recent exhibitions are:

Look Here, Mount Martha Community House, Mount Martha 1998

Western Ports Art Festival, Hastings 1998

Booragul, Padua College, Rosebud 1998

Tjinna Munda Mount Martha Community House, Mount Martha 1999

Family Ties Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery, Mornington 1999

Community Arts Projects include:

Various respect ceremonies through Melbourne and the South East Regions of Victoria, first professional performance in 1996. In association with two other Aboriginal artists, opened the Peninsula Aboriginal Arts and Crafts Community Gallery on the Mornington Peninsula. The coordinated Community Development mural, Chisolm TAFE, Frankston 1999.

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