Brenda L Croft

Brenda L. Croft (born 1964) is an Aboriginal Australian artist, curator, writer, and educator working across contemporary Indigenous and mainstream arts and cultural sectors. Croft was a founding member of the Boomalli Aboriginal Artists Cooperative in 1987.

Early life and education Croft was born in 1964 in Perth and is from the Gurindji, Malngin and Mudburra peoples, as well as having Anglo-Australian/German/Irish/Chinese heritage. She is the daughter of Joseph (Joe) Croft.

Croft took her first photograph in December 1974 on her mother's Box Brownie.

In 2018 she was appointed as Associate Professor, Indigenous Art History and Curatorship at the Australian National University.

Curatorial and other work

Croft was a founding member of the Boomalli Aboriginal Artists Cooperative in 1987. fluent: Emily Kame Kngwarreye, Yvonne Koolmatrie & Judy Watson, and was co-curated by Hetti Perkins, Croft and Victoria Lynn. It was commissioned by Michael Lynch.

In 2023, it was announced that Croft will serve as the Gough Whitlam and Malcolm Fraser Chair of Australian Studies at Harvard University in 2024, working with the Departments of History of Art and Architecture, and Art, Film, and Visual Studies.

Awards and recognition In 1996 Croft was the first Australian to receive the Chicago Artists International Program grant. She also was awarded the 1997 Australia Council for the Arts Greene Street Studio in New York; the 1998 Indigenous Arts Fellowship from the NSW Ministry for the Arts; an Alumni Award from UNSW in 2001; a 2015 Australia Council for the Arts National Indigenous Arts Award Fellowship; a Canberra Critics Circle Visual Arts Award for heart-in-hand in 2018; and the ANZ Best Indigenous Writing award for her practice-led doctoral research essay Still in my mind: Gurindji location, experience and visuality in 2018.

Croft was awarded an Honorary Doctorate (Visual Arts) from the University of Sydney in 2009.

Croft was named Visual Artist of the Year in the Deadly Awards 2013, which were the annual awards recognising Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander achievement. She won the Works on Paper Award at the 2023 National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Awards.

In 2007, Croft was amongst 60 artists profiled in Sonia Payes' book Untitled. Portraits of Australian Artists.

Artwork and exhibitions Artwork by Croft has been exhibited in galleries throughout Australia, and overseas including Germany, Hungary, Japan, the Netherlands, South Africa, the United Kingdom and the USA. Her work has been collected by the National Gallery of Australia, the Art Gallery of West Australia, the National Gallery of Victoria and the National Portrait Gallery. Her sculptural work, Wuganmagulya (Farm Cove), was installed at the Royal Botanic Garden, Sydney, as part of the 2000 Sydney Sculpture Walk program.