What does it mean to make art? For the artists in Top Arts 2025, it means wrestling with big questions, distilling complex ideas and trusting their instincts. Selected from over 1400 applicants, the forty students featured in this exhibition have created works that explore culture, identity, knowledge, beauty, portraiture, life and death, and the natural world – all while navigating the demands of VCE.
Their approaches are as diverse as their ideas. Some began with a clear concept, while others followed intuition, allowing the work to take shape organically. From painterly expressions on canvas to surreal animations and anthropomorphic installations, each piece is the culmination of a yearlong creative journey.
If you’re a VCE art student reading this, you may be wondering how to begin your own journey. Whether you feel overwhelmed by endless possibilities or are waiting for a spark of inspiration, the question of where to start is rarely straightforward. So how did the artists in Top Arts 2025 find their way? Exhibitor Miro Davis offers some wise advice: ‘Allow yourself to be open to the world around you and look inwards. Be present and truly observe the world you exist in – you are a vessel that ideas and art can flow through.’
While this may not satisfy those seeking a step-by-step guide, Davis’s insight underscores the importance of receptivity – being ready to absorb inspiration from the world around and within you. This mindset led her, during a summer holiday in early 2024, to notice a log resembling a human torso. That chance encounter sparked her interest in the anthropomorphic qualities of nature, and the log became a central element in her installation, Unfolding.
For Eddy Edwards, inspiration struck at a gig. As a music photographer, they were capturing shots of the band when they noticed someone with striking tattoos. After introducing themself, Edwards took what would become the first in a year-long series of portraits of tattooed strangers. While fascinated by their body art, Edwards was even more captivated by the unexpected details of their lives.
Sometimes, an idea takes root during an unexpected conversation. Natasha Poulos’s artistic journey began in the back of a car during a family visit to Indonesia amid the country’s presidential election. She asked the driver who he planned to vote for, and he simply replied, ‘The least corrupt one.’ That response compelled Poulos to examine the people’s deep-seated distrust in political leadership. Her work, At what cost?, features rice-paper money printed with the likeness of former Indonesian president Suharto spilling from a hessian sack, referencing a time of political and social turmoil.
For others, inspiration comes from art history. Codie Carter was initially drawn to the aesthetics of Vase of flowers on a windowsill by seventeenth-century Dutch artist Ambrosius Bosschaert. However, upon deeper reflection, Carter became intrigued by the symbolism in Dutch Golden Age still-life paintings. Her own work, Feast of flesh and fruit, subverts this tradition by juxtaposing the conventionally beautiful textures of fruit with the visceral, unsettling presence of animal parts.
Each of the above artists began with curiosity – an openness to noticing what captured their attention. When they found something compelling, they asked themselves why it mattered and how it could propel their work forward. For others, however, the best approach was simply to start. Arthur Bartura jumped straight onto the pottery wheel with little concern for convention or technique. The skewed forms that emerged revealed an interest in unconventional beauty, shaping the development of their work, All bark no bite.
Oli Wood also trusted the process. His hybrid approach – combining drawing, painting and photography – allowed meaning to emerge organically through experimentation. His work, Perennial ephemera, captures the cyclical nature of growth and decay in the natural world.
Similarly, Elkan Brady discovered the transformative nature of linocut carving and printing: ‘I found the physical intensity of carving enthralling – it was immersive and mindful. Once I was in the process, I began seeing the world as made up of carved lines, creating tones of light and dark. The printing, by contrast, was highly technical and required meticulous precision. It made me more alert.’
For Eva Philippiadis, the act of weaving was both a creative process and a connection to her cultural heritage: ‘The most interesting part of creating Hold me gently was the cultural knowledge I gained through the physical practice of weaving. It sent me into a meditative state, making me reflect on how and what my ancestors created.’
While some young artists waited for meaning to emerge through artmaking, others began with an idea or an interest and used the artmaking process to give it material form. The title of Georgina Quah’s work, The information action ratio, is inspired by cultural critic Neil Postman’s concept about the relationship between information consumption and action. Quah’s series of paintings – resembling social media posts on glossy smartphone screens – captures the overwhelming influx of digital imagery we absorb daily.
As a young Dja Dja Wurrung and Yorta Yorta woman, Charlie Claire Corcoran explores the relationship between colonisers and colonised people in her work, Upside down Country. While creating the quilt, she reflected on how the soil of Dja Dja Wurrung Country was turned over during colonisation and the gold rush. She embroidered native plants – once abundant but now rare – onto the surface of her quilt, honouring their cultural significance.
Piper Day highlighted the challenges faced by mixed-race individuals like herself, whose cultural heritage can be hidden. The title of her self-portrait, Gwai Mui, is Cantonese slang for a girl of non-Chinese or ‘Western’ appearance. The intricate layers of papercutting in her work reflect the process of connecting deeply with Chinese tradition.
Artmaking prompted some students to notice the fleeting beauty in the everyday. Looking at the world through the eyes of a painter, Isabella Godde identified the textures of her brother’s unmade bed as the perfect subject for painterly play.
Inspired by the mindful shaping of Japanese Zen gardens, Shakira Anderson drew scenes from her everyday life in sand on a lightbox. After photographing each composition, she would wipe it smooth and start again – finding in every ending a new beginning.
A lesson from Top Arts 2025 is that there is no single, reproducible approach to starting the creative journey. Art is inherently unpredictable. There will be good days and bad days. Doubt is part of the process, and it leads to unexpected and fascinating discoveries. The only certainty you have is that the creative journey will be yours alone. If you invest yourself fully in the process, as Top Arts exhibitors have, you will gain much more than a finished artwork by the end of it.
If you’re interested in learning more about the ideas and inspirations behind each exhibitor’s work, visit the Top Arts exhibition website. There, you’ll find artist interviews, folio pages, and details on teacher and student programs.
The NGV is proud to present Top Arts 2025 as part of its ongoing commitment to contemporary art and arts education, providing a platform for emerging Victorian artists to showcase their talents.
John Parkinson as an Educator at the National Gallery of Victoria.