Julia Morison (Born 1952, Pahiatua, Aotearoa New Zealand. Based in Ōtautahi Christchurch). 

Julia Morison’s ongoing practice – incorporating painting, sculpture, photography and installation – is consistently underpinned by a complex symbolic system. Her vocabulary is inspired by esoteric and spiritual sources, such as Hermeticism, the Kabbalah, alchemy, and memory systems. Morison’s work has come to represent her own intellectual order through an interweaving of symbol, material and philosophy, re-interpreting or reviewing for a contemporary context. Morison’s work invites us to reflect on the ways structures manipulate the way we see things, with her interpretations offering a metaphor for other such systems and encouraging us to consider systems themselves. 

Julia Morison has exhibited extensively within Aotearoa New Zealand and internationally for over three decades. She has been the recipient of many key awards, grants and residencies. Graduating first with Diploma in Graphic Design from Wellington Polytechnic School of Design, at Massey University, she then gained a Bachelor of Fine Arts with Honours from the University of Canterbury School of Fine Arts in 1975. In 1988, she was awarded the Frances Hodgkins Fellowship and, in 1990, she undertook the Möet and Chandon contemporary art residency in Avize, France. She subsequently remained in France for the next 10 years. In 1999, Morison returned to Christchurch and was appointed Senior Lecturer in painting at the University of Canterbury. In 2005, Morison received a New Zealand Arts Foundation Laureate Award and, in 2012, she was inducted into the Massey University Hall of Fame. Her exhibition Meet Me on the Other Side showed at the Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū and Wellington City Gallery in 2012, and at Two Rooms Gallery, Auckland, in 2012. Her Myriorama has been reworked in numerous configurations across many locations, including at the Sarjeant Gallery, Whanganui, 2011; the 17th Biennale of Sydney, 2010; the Adam Art Gallery, Wellington, 2009 and the Tauranga Art Gallery Toi Tauranga in 2010. Her major survey exhibition, Julia Morison: a loop around a loop, was also accompanied by a substantial monograph produced by the Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū and Dunedin Public Art Gallery in 2006. Julia Morison was a member of the curatorial group for SCAPE 6.