Practice 101: Building a Scalable Practice

Practice 101: Building A Scalable Practice  

Friday 26 June, 11am – 1pm 

M | Arts Precinct, Brisbane St Murwillumbah NSW 2484 

The old M | Arts Gallery, up the stairs next to Bistro Livi. 

Facilitated by artist Karma Barnes this session offers a practical introduction to ways artists can develop their practice in relation to scale, visibility and movement across different contexts. Drawing on experience working across exhibitions, touring projects and larger installation-based work, the session shares approaches to building on existing ideas rather than starting over. 

Discover strategies for upscaling and extending work, with a focus on recognising which projects might lend themselves to further development. Participants will be invited to consider how their work could be adapted, reconfigured or shared across different settings and to begin thinking about the systems that support this. 

Key areas include designing work with mobility in mind, from modular approaches to installation through to basic documentation considerations. Practical aspects of logistics, such as packing, freight and budgeting are introduced to give a general sense of what is involved in moving work beyond a single site.  

The session also emphasises maintaining an active and consistent practice, encouraging artists to keep making, testing ideas and keeping their materials current and ready to support opportunities as they arise.  

Interactive components, including a short-form artist pitch and small group discussions, create space for participants to reflect on their current work, trial ways of describing it and connect with other artists in the Northern Rivers. 

About the Facilitator:  

Karma Barnes is an interdisciplinary installation artist working across sculpture, expanded painting and site-responsive environments. Her practice examines ecological disruption, material transformation and the psychological terrains shaped by climate events. Through suspended sculptural systems, mineral pigments and earth-based materials, Barnes constructs immersive installations that operate as temporal ecologies, shifting, eroding and accumulating to reveal interdependence between human and more-than-human systems. 

In 2025 Barnes was awarded the Grand Prix of the Larnaca Biennale (Cyprus) and subsequently invited to present at the 10th Beijing International Art Biennale (China). She was also selected for the 20th Edition of the Arte Laguna Prize in Shanghai (China), chosen from two decades of international finalists Her installation CO-Lapses has been exhibited internationally in Venice, Shanghai and Beijing. In 2024 she was a finalist in the Arte Laguna Prize at Arsenale Nord, Venice, and her work entered the permanent collection of the New Mexico State University Art Museum (USA), marking her first institutional acquisition. Barnes maintains a regionally grounded practice while expanding her international exhibition presence. She is also a qualified art therapist specialising in adolescent mental health, trauma recovery and brain injury, and has contributed to creative recovery initiatives and worked within post-conflict and remote communities, experiences that inform the relational and socially responsive dimensions of her practice. 

Free event – spaces are limited.  

If you are unable to attend, please ensure you release your ticket so another local artist or arts worker can benefit from the session. If booked out, please join the waitlist and you will be notified if a place becomes available.