Nicole Smede is a multi-disciplinary artist of Warrimay Birrbay, English and Irish descent, living and creating on Gummēya Darrawal & Wodi Wodi Country. Proud of her lineage, she works with language reconnecting to ancestry and culture in song, sound and poetry.
A trained Mezzo-Soprano and graduate of the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, Nicole has performed at Parliament House, City Recital Hall, Mona Foma Festival, and galleries and venues across Australia and her voice has been heard globally on award-winning film scores. In her artistic practice, she has created meditations, songs, soundscapes and music for podcasts and plays and her poetry can be found in visual and sound pieces, exhibitions, journals, 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. In 2022 Nicole was a recipient of the inaugural Space to Create residency through Australia Council, Yil Lull Studio and ANU. In 2023 Nicole is a participant in Ngarra-Burria First Peoples Composers program working with Ensemble Offspring and a mentee through both the APRA AMCOS Women in Music program and South Coast Writers Centre Emerging Writers program.
Photo credit – Bonnie Porter Green
Nicole is supported by CIMF’s A Major Lift