Sarah Contos
Sarah Contos is an Australian artist, best known for artworks that incorporate textiles, screen printing, found objects and painting in a practice that can be described as collage, sculpture and installation-focused. She has been a finalist in a number of art prizes and exhibitions, including the John Fries Award and Redlands Konica Minolta Art Prize, and was the inaugural recipient of the $100,000 Ramsay Art Prize at the Art Gallery of South Australia. Education. In 1998 Contos completed a Diploma of Fine Arts at the Perth Central Metropolitan TAFE of Art, Design and Multimedia. In 2004 , she completed a Bachelor of Design for Performance at Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts and worked as a threatre costume and set designer. In 2009, Contos moved to Sydney to pursue her career as an artist. She completed a Masters of Art (Painting) at the College of Fine Arts (now UNSW Art & Design), University of New South Wales. Career. In the late 2000s, Contos began regularly exhibiting her artworks in group and solo exhibitions. In 2011, she was among six recipients of the Marten Bequest Scholarship. In 2013, she was a finalist in the John Fries Memorial Award and  one of three inaugural recipients of the 4a Beijing Study Program, alongside Tully Arnot and Jensen Tjhung. The following year, her work "Personification of Past and Future Mythologies (Double-Headed Barry)" was included in the Redlands Konica Minolta Art Prize. In 2015, she gained representation with influential gallerist Roslyn Oxley. In 2017, Contos won the inaugural $100,000 Ramsay Art Prize at the Art Gallery of South Australia with her work "Long Kiss Goodbye". The following year, she completed a residency at Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris and presented an installation for the Balnaves Contemporary Series at the National  Gallery of Australia called "Nikola Tesla Sends Theda Bara to Mars." In 2019, Contos was one of four artists who created site-specific installations for the Sofitel Darling Harbour for Sydney Contemporary. Contos explores identity, eroticism, femininity, materiality, popular culture and history. She describes her life in relation to contradictions, saying: “I make quilts for art but never for warmth. I watch cooking shows but never cook. I want to cover my home in florals, but it ends up in wine stained sequins”. Contos' practice is studio-based. Australian artist and curator Daniel Mudie Cunningham reflected on a studio visit  with the artist by saying, “Imagine a happy-sad catastrophe of colour and movement; an inviting lair where tactile sculptural forms appear embalmed in recycled teenage tears.”