Rachel Mackay is an emerging artist working on Gadigal land in Sydney, Australia. Her cross-disciplinary practice spans painting, performance, sculpture and moving image. Focusing on the body as archive, Mackay intertwines myth, memory and movement, blurring boundaries between materials and disciplines, and the conscious/subconscious body.
Growing up as a gymnast, Mackay’s interest in performance has been a driving force in shaping the narrative of her work. Through the contemporary lens of ‘expanded painting’, her process-based and performative approach interrogates the complexities of embodiment in a posthuman age, embracing the female body as a site of constant change and transformation. In doing so, she explores connections between human and more-than-human entities, and the ways in which bodies and environments interact and mutually shape one another.
Mackay has exhibited her work in various galleries across Sydney. Her work ‘Cosmic Bodies i’ was selected as a finalist for the Mosman Art Prize in 2022. She is currently undertaking a Master of Fine Arts at the National Art School of Australia.
