SJ Norman

Bio

SJ Norman (b. 1984) is an interdisciplinary artist, writer and cultural worker. His practice is counter-disciplinary and formally promiscuous. His body of work to date has included more than 20 works of long durational performance, and a significant body of other work embracing sculpture, photography, textiles, film and spatial audio. He is also the author of one book of fiction, with a second forthcoming. His work across forms is connected by a deep and abiding pre-occupation with the body and its mysteries, a concern originating from his foundational training in dance and theatre, as well as his Indigenous, queer, trans and disabled subjectivities.

For his work in the fine arts, performing arts and literature, Norman has been the recipient of numerous awards, including: the 67th Blake Prize (formerly the Blake Prize for Religious Art), a 2018 Sidney Myer Fellowship and a 2019 Australia Council Fellowship. Recent exhibitions include the 22nd Biennale of Sydney and the 4th National Indigenous Art Triennial. His acquisition history includes major public collections, such as the National Gallery of Australia.

His first work of fiction, Permafrost (UQP, 2020), won the 2017 Kill Your Darlings Prize for Unpublished Manuscript. It was listed for 6 major literary awards upon publication, including the Australian Society for Literature Gold Medal, the Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards in 2 categories, and the Stella Prize. He was awarded the 2022 Peter Blazey Prize for Non-Fiction for his essay The Salt Lake. He has been listed in many other prizes for prose and verse, including the Elizabeth Jolley Prize for Short Story and twice for the Judith Wright Prize for Poetry.

He works extensively as an independent curator of performance, music, public discourse and pedagogical programs. He has run workshops and masterclasses at many institutions, including Pratt Institute, Princeton University, University of California and the Center for Art and Research Alliances (CARA). In 2019, he initiated the Indigenous-led, queer-focused interdisciplinary arts and pedagogy platform Knowledge of Wounds, which he continues to co-organize with Dr Joseph M. Pierce (Cherokee Nation Citizen) since 2019.

He is a transmasculine Koori, born on Gadigal country. His maternal ties are to north-western Wiradjuri and Ngyiampaa-Wailwan Country (the community of Nyngan, NSW) and his paternal ties are to West Yorkshire, UK. He lives and works in Lenapehoking/New York City.

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