Maddison Gibbs

Born 1993 Gundungurra Country, Crookwell, NSW
Lives and works Wiradjuri Country, Kandos, NSW and Gadigal Country, Sydney
Gunu Baakandji

Maddison Gibbs is a proud Gunu Baakandji woman who grew up in Dubbo and currently lives and works between Sydney and Kandos. An artist and activist, Gibbs’ multidisciplinary practice explores Aboriginal stories past and present, balancing poetics and politics through ongoing concerns with caring for Country, intergenerational knowledge, and social justice. Working across painting, installation, sculpture, public art and community-led practice, Gibbs centres women’s narratives, alongside references to Aboriginal foods, medicines and flora drawn from Country, and ancestral knowledge systems.

Drawing on symbolic and organic forms derived from Country, her work is rendered through shifting registers of shadow and saturated colour, evoking the presence of past and present Indigenous ancestors while reflecting on dual histories and contemporary Aboriginal experience. Her practice moves fluidly between artistic and activist frameworks, foregrounding storytelling as a form of cultural continuation and resistance.

Gibbs has exhibited nationally as part of Vivid Sydney, 2018, Hobiennale, 2019, Bankstown Biennale, 2020, and Cementa Festival, 2024. Recent exhibitions include Where Shadows Meet at Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre, 2022, The Dingo Project at Ngununggula Regional Art Gallery, 2022, Nura: Deep Listening to Country at Cement Fondu, 2022, and Undercurrents at Penrith Regional Gallery, 2023.

In 2018, Gibbs was part of the team that restored the iconic 40,000 Years mural in Redfern. She was the recipient of the Australian Museum’s Young Indigenous Artist Fellowship in 2019 and was shortlisted for the Create NSW Artspace Visual Arts Fellowship in 2023. In 2026, she unveiled a large public artwork on the Sydney Harbour Bridge Cycleway Ramp.