Nicole Smede is a multidisciplinary artist of Worimi, Irish and colonial descent, living and creating on Wadi Wadi Dharawal Country. A re-connection to ancestry, language and culture ripples through her work in voice, song, sound and poetry, exploring what it means to be ‘of Country’.
A trained mezzo soprano and graduate of the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, Nicole has performed and recorded repertoire from classical, theatre, rock and contemporary music through to film and other media. Her voice has been heard on Triple J as well as globally on award-winning film scores, and graced the stages of City Recital Hall, Parliament House, MONA FOMA festival to art galleries and venues across Australia.
Nicole has received commissions for meditations, poetry, soundscapes and music for podcasts, plays, ensembles and choirs. Her poetry can be found in journals, visual and sound pieces, exhibitions, publications and anthologies. In 2020, Nicole was the co-recipient of the 2020 Shoalhaven Arts Board Grant, a finalist in the Meroogal Women’s Art Prize and shortlisted for the 2020 Red Room Poetry Fellowship. Nicole has also been a finalist in the Newcastle Poetry Prize (2022), a recipient of the inaugural Space to Create residency through Australia Council, Yil Lull Studio and ANU (2022), the South Coast Writers Centre Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Writing Mentorship (2023), an APRA AMCOS Women in Music mentee (2023) and is currently a participant in The Ngarra-Burria First Peoples Composer program (2024).
Nicole sings with Yuin based Koori women’s choir Mudjingaal Yangamba and is proud to revitalise language, sharing stories through song, with her Aunts and sisters.
Nicole’s work is acquired and held in national collecting institutions.
Photo credit – @teschka