Climate Futures Artist Fellowship
What social impact will climate change have on future generations? How will these changes take shape within our cultural and artistic spaces?
The Climate Futures Artist Fellowship invites 2 artists to use any art form to imagine a future where art and climate intersect in profound and meaningful ways.
The fellowship includes:
- $15,000 funding
- desk space at the Library for 12 months
- access to collections and Library staff expertise.
Funding is based on approximately 3 months of work in the Library. This can be either continuous or broken up over the year, and you’ll have access to your office for the full 12 months.
2025 recipients
Dr Anna McMichael – Sounds of the White Continent: Sounds and sights of Antarctica
Leading violinist and Head of Strings at Monash University Dr Anna McMichael will create an immersive multimedia project which explores the impact of climate change on Antarctica. Drawing on the Library’s collection of historic photographs and records of Antarctic exploration, Dr McMichael will also commission new works of music and soundscapes, with plans for a performance of the project at the Library.
Anna McMichael is a violinist, artistic researcher and educator who is in demand as an experienced musician who performs diverse styles of music from early to experimental. Anna is the Classical Convenor and Strings Coordinator at the Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music and Performance, Monash University.
Vei Tan and Patrick Macasaet – The Great Reclamation: A speculative archive of climate futures
The Great Reclamation reimagines State Library Victoria as a wondrous, climate-altered future, no longer a static repository of the past, but an active participant in shaping what comes next. Set within a gaming environment, developed by SUPERSCALE, the Library becomes terrain – alive with ecological memory, transformed artifacts, architectural matter and atmospheric change. As players wander, they uncover altered fragments of narrative, material and ecological history. Each discovery contributes to a living archive, weaving together forgotten stories and reimagined knowledge.
Vei Tan and Dr Patrick Macasaet are co-founders of SUPERSCALE, a research-led and speculative multidimensional creative practice that expands architectural thinking across disciplines. Their work spans virtual worlds, gaming, installation, self-builds, publications, pedagogy and cultural curation – embracing architecture’s intersections with climate, technology and popular culture. As educators and researchers at RMIT University, they also co-lead the RMIT Architecture & Urban Design Immersive Futures Lab. Their work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, including at the Venice Architecture Biennale, ACMI, Melbourne Design Week, Federation Square and the Barcelona Architectures Festival.
Previous recipients
Learn more about the inspiring projects undertaken by past and present fellows in our fellows gallery.
- 2024: Michael Dulaney for the project Sentinels: Dispatches From The Human-Animal Interface In The Age Of Climate Change, a non-fiction book exploring how human impacts on the environment are driving more infectious diseases to jump from animals to humans.
- 2024: Dr Ana Lara Heyns and Professor N'arwee't Carolyn Briggs AM for the project Weegabeel Warreeny Maar: Reclaiming Water Country,exploring coastal communities' geological and cultural histories regarding rising sea levels and examining Boonwurrung narratives through a multidisciplinary approach to the Library's collections.