ABOUT
Anna Dowling is a Yamatji Badimia woman, born and raised on Kaurna Country in Adelaide, South Australia — a visual artist, psychotherapist, and creative whose practice lives at the intersection of culture, healing, and story.
Working in ink on paper, her art draws on traditional symbols, patterns, and Badimia heritage. It is intimate and unflinching — moving through themes of intergenerational trauma, identity, strength, and the enduring resilience of Aboriginal culture. Her 2016 series The Infinite Line traced the psychological and physiological transmission of historic trauma through dispossession, weaving DNA imagery, fingerprints, and traditional cultural marks into a single visual language. Her 2017 series Our Journey was presented at the Reconciliation SA Stolen Generations Breakfast — work made not for galleries alone, but for the people whose stories it carries.
Anna's recognised practice began with the Don Dunstan Foundation Our Mob Emerging Artist Prize at 21. She went on to become a finalist in the Telstra National Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Art Awards, win the MAX Employment Indigenous Youth Art Prize at Parliament House Sydney, and exhibit in solo and curated group shows across South Australia and New South Wales. She has held artist-in-residencies on The Ghan and throughout Catholic Education schools in South Australia. Her work is held in the City of Adelaide Civic Collection.
Anna holds a Bachelor of Behavioural Science and a Master of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy from Flinders University. Her clinical practice and her art are not separate — both are acts of witnessing, and of holding complexity with care.
Alongside her partner Andrew, Anna co-creates Homegrown Urban Homestead — a platform exploring self-sufficiency, economic resilience, and life built with intention. It is the same instinct that runs through all her work: to protect what matters, preserve what is at risk of being lost, and pass something real to the next generation.
Working in ink on paper, her art draws on traditional symbols, patterns, and Badimia heritage. It is intimate and unflinching — moving through themes of intergenerational trauma, identity, strength, and the enduring resilience of Aboriginal culture. Her 2016 series The Infinite Line traced the psychological and physiological transmission of historic trauma through dispossession, weaving DNA imagery, fingerprints, and traditional cultural marks into a single visual language. Her 2017 series Our Journey was presented at the Reconciliation SA Stolen Generations Breakfast — work made not for galleries alone, but for the people whose stories it carries.
Anna's recognised practice began with the Don Dunstan Foundation Our Mob Emerging Artist Prize at 21. She went on to become a finalist in the Telstra National Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Art Awards, win the MAX Employment Indigenous Youth Art Prize at Parliament House Sydney, and exhibit in solo and curated group shows across South Australia and New South Wales. She has held artist-in-residencies on The Ghan and throughout Catholic Education schools in South Australia. Her work is held in the City of Adelaide Civic Collection.
Anna holds a Bachelor of Behavioural Science and a Master of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy from Flinders University. Her clinical practice and her art are not separate — both are acts of witnessing, and of holding complexity with care.
Alongside her partner Andrew, Anna co-creates Homegrown Urban Homestead — a platform exploring self-sufficiency, economic resilience, and life built with intention. It is the same instinct that runs through all her work: to protect what matters, preserve what is at risk of being lost, and pass something real to the next generation.