Joan Grounds

Joan Grounds (born 31 August 1939) is an American-born artist based in Melbourne. She has been exhibiting in Australia and internationally from 1967. Her solo and collaborative artwork is held in the National Gallery of Australia (ceramics), the National Gallery of Victoria (both film and ceramics) and in the Powerhouse Museum of Arts and Applied Sciences (ceramics). Her hybrid practice incorporated ceramics, sculpture, sound art, film and performance art.

Early life and education Grounds was born in Atlanta, United States, in 1939. She obtained a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Tulane University in 1962 and a Master of Arts from the University of California, Berkeley in 1964.

After meeting and marrying American/Australian artist Marr Grounds, she lived in Ghana for two years while he lectured in architecture at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in Kumasi.

She taught at East Sydney Technical College

Themes "Joan Grounds' work...engages with nature, with the placement of women, with the body of women, with memory and with ways of exploring all of these." (Julie Ewington, 2001)

"The installations are as formal and elusive as music. And you are the music while the music lasts." (George Alexander, 1989)

Recognition

2002 ASIALINK Residency, Chiang Mai, Thailand

Collections National Gallery of Australia (10 works, including Red-green duration: from the portfolio "Rare birds with sticky wings") National Gallery of Victoria (4 works, including We should call it a living room and Package) Powerhouse Museum, Sydney (several, including Ceramic parcel)