In the selection process, a panel of three will select the successful applicant. The panel will be: the property owner and host, Marina Ely; a Sculpture Bermagui Committee member; a local resident and art enthusiast.

Consideration of each applicant includes the host’s responsibility to ensure the successful applicant will respect the spatial and personal boundaries of her family and permanent tenants who also reside on the property.
*A Working with Children Check will also be required.

• A clear project or goal, which aligns with the ethos of Narra Bukulla
• The quality of work previously produced
• How this residency will contribute to the artist’s career
• A proposal that will contribute in an interesting/innovative way to our local community and Sculpture Bermagui, with consideration of the public event and potential exhibition. NB: Sculpture Bermagui will make all reasonable accommodation for the needs of your exhibition.
• Viability of the project regarding resources, context, time frame and location.

• 30th March     – Applications open
  Following this, shortlisted applicants will be notified to arrange a meeting (face-to-face or video link)

• 25th May         – Applications close (midnight)

• 15th June      – Successful applicant notified

Residency runs from 20th Oct to 20th Dec. 2026

Creative artists of all disciplines, genres and levels of experience may apply. The Narra Bukulla artist in residence’s time and space is yours to develop existing or new ideas and projects, conduct research, experiment and innovate.

• The accommodation included locally & nearby is for one person or a couple.   The artist’s stay will be as a tenant, not as an employee.
• Travel costs will be at the artist’s own expense, no sponsorship nor visa or working rights will be included in this AIR. The artist will need their own health insurance.
• The host asks that there are no parties during your stay
• Refrain from making loud noise (eg. power tools, loud music) between the hours of 8pm – 8am.
• It is expected that the AIR artist respects the boundaries of all residents on the property.
• Assistance Dogs are welcome. As Narra Bukulla is surrounded by a National Park and the AIR private area is not fenced, companion dogs are unlikely to be permitted. Please contact Marina Ely, the host, to discuss whether the artist’s four-legged companion might be an exception to this. There is a well-trained dog on the property, residing with Marina and inside a fenced garden.
• During the residency, an open studio, or public event, will be organised for an activity such as an artist talk, a demonstration, a creative workshop, performance or educational activity.
• The artist will have copyright and moral rights of their work, these will be respected and acknowledged. Consent will be asked for prior use of their name or images of their work. Such use may include future promotion of the residency and will always occur in consultation with the artist.
• The artist will be given the opportunity to be a featured artist in Sculpture Bermagui 2027, offering a highly prized spot in which to showcase their work.

Applications are free and occur once per year.

A semi- accessible, self contained, private use studio space inside a large, insulated shed. It was built by artist Marr Grounds, the late father of the host, Marina Ely. Sculpture Bermagui supports this AIR to assist artists to develop their individual practice.

You are welcome to contact us for more details about accessibility.
Please see the to-scale floorplan below and consider the following: access to the property and all the roads on the property are unsealed roads; studio access is via an electrically opening roller-door (3m wide); door-ways have small steps with short ramps; 880mm wide bathroom door; the bathroom includes a toilet with 480mm seat height and 720 depth to wall; cistern and flush height 840mm; a ceiling shower rose plus a wall-mounted, hand-held shower with tap positioned 1200mm high; door handles & light switches at 1050mm high; kitchen bench & sink 900 high with 800mm knee/toe clearance; stove shelf 850mm high with 820 knee/toe clearance.

We must emphasise the remoteness of the property. It requires that you have your own car (or hire one) and feel comfortable living isolated in a bush setting.

The shed also has two attached but separate bays that may also be accessed: including workshop areas for woodworking and metalworking. The shed was for Marr’s own art practice, in addition to many other artists who used it to make their site-specific artworks on the property. These two separate workshops can be used by the AIR artist, in negotiation with the other residents on the property, who access the workshops for their own projects.

The residency is free, and runs for 2 months, 20th October – 20th December 2026. The successful applicant will receive a stipend of $2500.

You will be required to pay for your own food and materials during your stay. Tours by your host to local attractions can be arranged.

This residency is self-directed and offers you a unique opportunity to become immersed in an inspiring natural environment and idyllic studio space.

Other Items

• WiFi internet (Starlink) and other utilities included
• Please note: there is no mobile phone reception
• Laundry facilities available (shared)
• Tables, chairs, furnishings are provided.
• Shops are located in our nearest towns Tathra (10km), Bega (20km), Bermagui (25km).

Bring any materials you need for your practice. There are tools in the shared workshop areas of the shed. Please prepare appropriate private and product insurance for all your own materials, artworks and belongings.

Food, groceries and meal preparation will be at your own expense – the accommodation includes a small kitchen.

Who
Marina Ely, property owner: I am a mother, an artist and nature enthusiast, high school science teacher, scuba diver. My favourite thing is to watch nature’s cycles, interactions and creatures: their worldly lives marching on around us; their relationships; their challenges to live and love and build, drawing what I see or being inspired to adopt their methods in my own life. My childhood experiences in nature, globally, influenced me to study Environmental Science. Emphasising the importance of our need to become more sustainable as a society drove me into education as a profession, alongside constant campaigning. I wish for dad’s fabulous studio and workshop spaces to be enjoyed and used by many: and so came the Artist in Residence idea!

Marina’s family includes her husband, two sons, dog, parrot and chickens. Her mother, Bonita Ely, regularly visits, plays and is inspired with ideas and makes art. She has made over a thousand artworks on paper, videos and several installations depicting our coastline, its sounds and tides, its transient and ephemeral nature. Bonita has also used the AIR studio to create large scale works. Recently, Bonita and Marina had an exhibition of their works at the regional gallery in Bega, South East Centre for Contemporary Art. The catalogue can be found here https://secca.com.au/exhibition/bonita-ely-bithry-time/
Marr Grounds, Marina’s late father, bought Narra Bukulla and produced many site-specific artworks on the property. Family friends have also been creatively inspired, such as Sandy Edwards’s photographic collection leading to an exhibition and the publication, “Paradise is a Place”; author Gillian Mears wrote a semi-autobiographical essay for the book, following this her stays at Narra Bukulla led to several publications; artist Nigel Lendon collaborated with Marr to make many sculptures on the property.

Both Sir Roy Grounds (Marina’s grandfather) and Marr Grounds (father) were visionary in their early adoption of environmental design principles. They were forward thinking in their consideration of sustainable building materials, and reducing the impact of building processes. They were also both master craftsmen, loved tinkering in their workshop, endlessly imaginative, playful and skilled in their creative processes. Marina is similarly inclined – her 2023 renovations used recycled timber and render using clay dug from the garden, designed in collaboration with local builder, Peter Bertuleit.

Other families live on the property. They share the work and harvest from the gardens and orchards – you are welcome too, during your stay.

The presence of Djiringanj people can be felt throughout Narra Bukulla and its surrounds. Their enduring cultural practices — honouring all life forms and continuing to create and innovate — shape how this place is understood and cared for. I feel a deep sense of respect and gratitude for this ongoing stewardship and the knowledge it carries. In my own life and work here, I seek to listen for and learn from these practices: holding space for Country-healing, truth-telling, and the continuation of knowledge across generations, as part of a shared responsibility to care for this place and to live more sustainably within it.

What
The property is a 47-acre bush block encompassing three hills and two valleys with mainly Corymbia maculatai spotted gum trees. The “main-house” at Narra Bukulla is a solar-passive, award winning sustainably-designed home.

Narra Bukulla is a habitat for a diversity of flora and fauna. It is a home with a plethora of wild animals that the human residents respectfully adapt their lives to accommodate: a rodent-eating python selects the main-house pantry to hibernate in each winter and she is given every opportunity to enter all recesses to repel the fellow rodent residents. Red-belly black snakes breed in the garden beds and feast upon the orchestratic frog populations. Maggies nest in a tree by the dam, raising chicks each year and are alert for any interesting visitors – goannas, raptors, etc. SO MANY birds – too many to list them! A mob of kangaroos are given right-of-way at all times, even while walking, and are so accustomed to the rumble-tumble of kids’ play that they lounge about in the shady-spots most days. The resident dog is carefully trained not to chase them. The large dam is perfect for swimming & kayak paddling alongside the ducks and tadpoles. At night frogs, cicadas, the screeches and wails of yellow-bellied gliders may be heard, many different owls and, of course, the odd brush-tailed possum scuffle too.

The human residents live on these lands with respectful knowledge that “owning” it gives them great privileges, and that the sovereignty of these lands was never ceded by the Djiringanj people.

Where

Spotted gums at Penders pic by M Ely

The lands and waters of Narra Bukulla are and always will be Djiringanj Country, Yuin Nation. It is a property adjacent to Mimosa Rocks National Park, Tanja, NSW.