I am a Malaysian Bidayǔh/Anglo Australian artist who makes video and installation art. In my practice, I have often engaged with sites of contemporary cultural crises, and used field research, documentary techniques and digital processes to question established discourses and reveal bias, frailty and failure. Recently my practice also engages with my Bidayǔh heritage, piecing together language, landscape and story to celebrate Bidayǔh knowledge and explore its radical potential to upend contemporary Western ideologies. I was born and raised on the Larrakia lands known as Darwin. I currently live and work on the Gadigal and Wangal lands known as Sydney’s Inner West.
Selected Group Exhibitions and Festivals:
2022 The Lock Up, NSW (upcoming)
2022 Disorganising, Bus Projects + West Space + Liquid Architecture, VIC (upcoming)
2021 Crisis Actor, PACT Centre for Emerging Artists, NSW
2021 Makeshift, RMIT University, VIC
2021 No Show, Carriageworks, NSW
2020 20:20, Murray Art Museum Albury (MAMA), NSW
2020 NSW Visual Arts (Emerging) Fellowship, Artspace, NSW
2020 Preppers, online
2019 Preppers, Fremantle Arts Centre, WA
2019 The Freedman Foundation Exhibition, UNSW Galleries, NSW
2019 Biting Morsel, Verge Gallery, NSW
2017 Adhocracy 2017, SA
2017 Almost Doco, RealTime Video Gallery, online
Tours:
Bamboo Paradise, as part of the group show Preppers, supported by Art on the Move, toured at:
- Geraldton Regional Art Gallery, WA (2020)
- Katanning Art Gallery, WA (2020)
- Museum of the Goldfields, WA (2021)
- Albany Town Hall, WA (2021)
- The Cannery Arts Centre, WA (2021)
Prizes:
2022 Finalist, National Photography Prize (upcoming), NSW
2021 Finalist, The Churchie National Emerging Art Prize, QLD
2020 Finalist, Fisher's Ghost Art Award, NSW
2020 Finalist, NSW Visual Arts (Emerging) Fellowship
2020 Finalist, Goolugatup Heathcote Digital Art Prize, WA
2019 Recipient, The Freedman Foundation Travelling Scholarship, NSW
2018 Finalist, The 65th Blake Prize, NSW
2014 Winner, Macquarie Digital Portraiture Award, ACT
Solo Exhibitions:
2022 Head Party, Bus Projects, VIC (upcoming)
2020 Tarun, Prototype, online
2019 Hard As You Can, Prototype, online
2019 One Million Views, Closed on Monday Gallery, online
2018 Bliss Me, Constance ARI, TAS
2016 One Million Views, Success, WA
Collaborations:
2021 A Sunken Garden, with Lyndon Blue, Girls School Gallery, WA
2020 Panic Buy, with Guy Louden, Sawtooth ARI, TAS, online
2020 Panic Buy, with Guy Louden, Girls School Gallery, WA
2017 Apocalypse Anonymous, with Loren Kronemyer, The Big Anxiety Festival 2017, NSW
2016 One Million Views, with Xanthe Dobbie, Next Wave Festival 2016, VIC
Selected Residencies and Activities:
2021 SEM/ALAM Art Lab, Centre for Urban Mythologies + Grimis Art Project Malaysia, online
2021 Perth Institute of Contemporary Art (PICA) Interdisciplinary Lab, online
2020 Residency, Freedman Foundation Travelling Scholarship, Sarawak
2019 Residency, Chronus Art Centre, on invitation from Pony Express, Shanghai
2017 Residency, Frontyard Projects, NSW
2016 Residency, Perth Institute of Contemporary Art, WA
2014 Residency, Red Gate Gallery, Beijing
Education:
2012 Bachelor of Fine Arts/Bachelor of Arts, UNSW
2010 Digital Media Studies, Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing, China (exchange program)
2009 Porosity Studio, Donghua University, Shanghai, China (exchange program)
Selected Bibliography:
2021 Pamela See. Exhibition review: The Churchie Emerging Art Prize. ArtsHub.
2021 Madeline Brewer. ‘the churchie’ emerging art prize 2021. The Review Board.
2021 Dinushi Dias. Goldfields museum exhibition reveals what you may have in common with doomsday preppers. ABC Goldfields.
2021 Phoebe Chen. Radical Ecologies. Carriageworks Journal.
2020 Gina Fairley. Exhibition Review: 2020 NSW Visual Arts Emerging Fellowship, Artspace. ArtsHub.
2020 Barnaby Smith. Tiyan Baker and Guy Louden on the cold poetics of the pandemic. Art Guide.
2020 Preppers and the YOYO (You’re on your own culture). We Make Money Not Art.
2020 5 Questions with Tiyan Baker. Liminal Magazine.
2020 Miranda Johnson. Prepping for Doomsday. Seesaw Magazine.
2020 Ben Rodin. I Feel A Song Coming On. Semaphore.
2019 Stuart Richards. Prototype review: experimental Australian films as poetic diary entries. The Conversation.
2019 Shelley Wang. Artist of the Week. ARC UNSW.
2014 James Purtill. Digital artist Tiyan Melissa Kilie Baker's portraits depict memories of love and loss in Beijing. ABC Radio Darwin.
2014 Jane Somerville. Identities in digital: Macquarie Digital Portraiture Award. ArtsHub.
2014 Siobhan Heanue. Lonely landscapes of love: digital portraiture award goes to young Northern Territory artist. ABC News.
I live and work on the lands of the Gadigal and Wangal people of the Eora nation.
This sovereign land was never ceded.
The land I live on always was and always will be Aboriginal land.