Hi, I’m NancyDee

I am a found object assemblage artist and jewellery designer in Melbourne, Australia. I create wall sculptures, 3D sculptures and brooches from metal, wood, tiles and plastic that I pick up off the streets of cities where I live or travel. 

My art is inspired by a strong interest in sustainability through repurposing and upcycling. My works have been described variously as ‘quirky’, ‘imaginative’, ‘environmentally aware’, ‘industrial’ and ‘geometric’ – and occasionally, even ‘beautiful’.

I was very excited to win first prize for sculpture at the 2025 Daffodil and Arts Festival, held at The Old Auction House in Kyneton, for my wall sculpture in a drawer called Meditation. The judge was Laurie Benson, Curator, International Art, at the National Gallery of Victoria.

Subsequently, the Beyond City Limits exhibition, organised by Melbourne and Victoria Artists (MAVA) and also held at The Old Auction House in Kyneton, received an excellent review. The reviewer’s comments about my work, Boundaries Visible and Invisible, is in the third to last paragraph.

Finally, my work Plasticus Fantasticus Maximus (photo left) won the ‘Most Original’ prize in the Melbourne and Victoria Artists (MAVA) Minimalist/Maximalist Art Prize. It was on exhibition with the other winners at the Artemisia Gallery in Windsor from 18 February – 1 March 2026.

In Australia my brooches and wall sculptures are available through Artocracy in Brunswick, Far Fetched Designs in Seddon and Joel Gallery in Altona. In North Melbourne, Stranger Than Paradise carries a few of my tiniest cityscape brooches.

Current Exhibitions and Markets

Lockdown Days (group exhibition reflecting on Covid lockdown)
Fitzroy Public Gallery, Level 2, 125 Smith St, Fitzroy
Opening Friday 24 April 2026, 6-9pm. All welcome. Closes 3 May 2026

Extra, Extra! (group show of the Contemporary Sculptors Association)
Yarra Sculpture Gallery, 117 Vere Street, Abbotsford
12 April – 3 May 2026. Opening 12 April 2-4pm, all invited.

Launceston Paste-up Project (taking place for the first time as a part of the street art event, Thoroughfare)
Launceston, Tasmania, from 28 March 2026 indefinitely until the paste-ups get pasted over. My paste-up promotes the If Trees Could Talk exhibition indicated below.

If Trees Could Talk International Art Biennale (a project of the Tumba-Tumba Children’s Museum of Philippine Art and The Center for Art, New Ventures & Sustainable Development, with curation by Marahuyo Art Projects)
Quezon City, Philippines
28 February – 26 July 2026
My collage was created from eucalypt and melaleuca bark, and if these trees could talk, they would say: “Behold our beautiful bark. We shed it seasonally to help us grow strong, control pests and adapt better to bush fires.” 

A4 Art Australia (group show held by the Contemporary Art Society of Victoria as part of the Herring Island Summer Arts Festival). Although the exhibition closed on 6 April, the works are available for sale online until the end of June 2026. My works are numbers 334-337.

Space2b (where sales support refugees, asylum seekers and migrants to become financially independent through creative enterprise, workplace training and business mentoring)
144 Chapel Street, St Kilda, VIC
Two of my works from the A3ffordable Art Fair are available in the shop. Open Tuesday-Friday 10am-5pm, Saturday 10am-2pm.

Forthcoming Events 2026

Incognito (group show of A5 artworks with all proceeds donated to organisations supporting artists with disabilities)
Exhibitions in Sydney and Brisbane, as well as online
24 June – December 2026

Frequencies (group show)
The Old Auction House, 52-56 Mollison Street, Kyneton VIC
November/December 2026

Sculpture Now (group show for Contemporary Sculptors Association members)
Yarra Sculpture Gallery, 117 Vere Street, Abbotsford
Opening 6 December 2026

See previous solo and group exhibitions.

Recent Articles, Videos and Podcasts

‘Nancy Lane OAM finds art at her feet’, article on page 1 of the North West Melbourne News, Issue 212 Autumn 2026 written by Wilson Cheng

‘Broken in Beauty’, video on YouTube created by Chhung Heaur Taing, a master’s student in Media and Communications at Swinburne University of Technology, about the problem of waste in Australia and how I’ve tried to do my small part by repurposing it into art 

‘Nancy Lane Turns Street Scraps into Streetscapes’, Market to Melrose podcast interview with Tom Rigby

‘Faces of West Melbourne: Nancy D Lane’, article on the West Melbourne Neighbourhood Portal on the City of Melbourne website

Instagram reel about my exhibition Zero Waste: Doing It Imperfectly at the Belconnen Regional Arts Centre

Youtube video interview about the creation and installation of the outdoor sculpture Termite Mound Revisited at Eden Gardens, Macquarie Park, NSW

Instagram

Follow me on Instagram at @nancydeesculptures  and  @nancydeebrooches.

I am also the facilitator for Creativity Cluster. You can view the Creativity Cluster website or follow us on Instagram at @creativitycluster.