Rory Randall is a bit of a weirdo, which makes sense considering their hodgepodge of personal and professional experiences. They are a mad identifying, ex-patient, psychiatric survivor. After about ten years of pretty mediocre experiences as a mental health service user and some work in community services they realized that the party line of mental health/illness and associated frameworks were not working for them. They now try to ensure that they are working toward making space for non-individualizing responses to distress and unusual experiences which expand individuals' sense of connection to what is meaningful to them whilst upholding their dignity and human rights. At the moment this looks like narrative informed peer support work in alternative to hospital type spaces, research into discrimination of the consumer workforce and some work informing resources for mental health nurses.

Mitch Mahoney is an emerging Indigenous (Boon Wurrung) artist who has a passion for marine biology and transdisciplinary creative practice. He has a Diploma of Visual Arts at Hunter TAFE School of Arts, received a scholarship for the National Gallery of Australia Summer Arts School, and participated in arts development training at Museums Victoria. Mitch has produced commissioned artworks for Life Without Barriers (2014), Wingecarribee Shire Council (2014), the Koorie Heritage Trust (2015), Linuwell Steiner School (2016) and Knox City Council (2018). He was also contracted by the Canada Council of the Arts to collaborate with three other Australian Aboriginal artists and four Canadian Aboriginal artists to produce a possum skin cloak and a buffalo robe, as a cultural infusion project to mark the 150th year of Canadian confederation as part of Wrapped in Culture in 2017.

Annabel Yenson is a first-year university student with an interest in IT. I love the idea of blending art with science and that is why I wanted to join Sci Curious, as it brings two of my passions together and turns it into amazing pieces of artwork. My time at the Science Gallery of Melbourne has really allowed me to grow as a person and develop my interests outside my university degree. My favourite part of the gallery is finally seeing the unique exhibitions and knowing that all our effort and dedication has paid off. I can’t wait to see everyone’s reactions to the new artwork that has been chosen for this exhibit!

Liv Handfield Born and raised in Naarm (Melbourne), Liv has spent her whole life curious about the sciences. In joining Science Gallery Melbourne Sci-Curious Think Tank group, she has combined this interest with her passion for fine art. Throughout her high school education, she has taken an active leadership role in student-led environmental and charitable initiatives, participated in the Kwong Lee Dow Young Scholars Program established by Melbourne University, and she qualified for and attended the Australian Biology Olympiad Summer School in 2019. Liv currently works as a tutor instructing high school students in a range of subjects.

Alec Reade is an emerging producer, artist, and community arts facilitator, who is invested in representations of autonomy within the Oceanic community. Of mixed-Fijian heritage, as a settler, Alec seeks to interrogate their positionality on this vast and complex continent. This includes practices of critical consciousness and self-assessment towards the production of creative works, prioritising cultural exchange, Oceanic narratives and ideas that can empower. Alec has produced events for Melbourne Fringe Festival, Midsumma Festival, Due West Arts Festival, Footscray Community Arts Centre, Blak Dot Gallery, Wyndham City Cultural Centre, and SIGNAL. They have co-curated for Blak Dot Gallery, Artspace (Sydney), and Connection Arts Space. Alec was formerly an Artistic Associate for the biennial Due West Arts Festival in 2019, and an Associate Producer for Next Wave Festival 2020. Alec is intrigued by many forms of storytelling and the ways it is creatively embodied, engaging with work that centers the practice as a form of liberation, analysis and connection.

Ryan Jefferies

Tilly Boleyn

Prof. Mark Elgar, Professor in Evolutionary Biology, The University of Melbourne

Prof Mark Elgar is an evolutionary biologist at The University of Melbourne and has published numerous scientific articles on the mating and social behaviour of insects and spiders, including the role of pheromones in courtship. He completed a PhD at Cambridge University and worked as a Science and Engineering Research Fellow at University of Oxford. His research focuses on conflict and cooperation in animal mating and social behaviour, and the role of chemical signals and diversity of receptor organs (antennae) in animal communication. Mark is Field Chief Editor of Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, and Chief Section Editor of Social Evolution.

Luke Briscoe, Director and Founder of IndigiLab

Yalanji man Luke Briscoe (Junjirrba Wawu Kaitbal) has worked professionally in the arts, cultural, education and policy sectors including NITV/SBS, National Congress of Australia's First Peoples, The Australia Council, Metro Screen and Youth Arts Queensland. Mr Briscoe has developed and delivered a range of groundbreaking arts and media programs including an arts business training program and setup the Indigenous Media RING employment program and in 2015 Mr Briscoe founded INDIGI LAB which is an award winning change management agency that provides consultancy in the areas of Digital Inclusion, Indigenous STEM Education and Indigenous led Sustainable Development.

Dr. Airlie Chapman, Senior Lecturer in Mechatronics at The University of Melbourne

Airlie Chapman a senior lecturer in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Melbourne. She received the Ph.D. degree from the William E. Boeing Aeronautics and Astronautics Department at the University of Washington, Seattle in 2013. She received the M.S. degree in Mathematics from University of Washington (2013) and the M.S. degree and the B.S. degree from the University of Sydney, Australia (2008 and 2006. Dr. Chapman was awarded the L'Oreal-UNESCO for Women in Science Fellowship and is a two-time recipient of the Amelia Earhart Fellowship. Her research interests are multi-agent dynamics, networked dynamic systems, data-driven control and graph theory with applications to robotics and aerospace systems. She has recently authored the book “Semi-Autonomous Networks” published by Springer in 2015

Amie Kaufman , Science Fiction Writer

Amie Kaufman is a New York Times and internationally bestselling author of young adult fiction. Her multi-award winning work is slated for publication in over 30 countries, and has been described as “a game-changer” (Shelf Awareness), “stylistically mesmerising” (Publishers Weekly) and “out-of-this-world awesome” (Kirkus). Her series include The Illuminae Files, The Aurora Cycle, the Other Side of the Sky duology, The Starbound Trilogy, the Unearthed duology and The Elementals Trilogy. Her work is in development for film and TV, and has taken home multiple Aurealis Awards, an ABIA, a Gold Inky, made multiple best-of lists and been shortlisted for the Prime Minister’s Literary Awards. Raised in Australia and occasionally Ireland, Amie has degrees in history, literature, law and conflict resolution, and is currently undertaking a PhD in Creative Writing. She lives in Melbourne with her husband, daughter and rescue dog, and an extremely large personal library.

Prof. Mark Pollard, Interactive Composition, Melbourne Conservatorium of Music

Mark is founding Head of Interactive Composition at the Faculty of Fine Arts and Music, University of Melbourne. He is a composer, educator and curator of music, whose research over 30 years spans a broad range of sound, cross-media and cross-genre areas.

With a love for everything about music, Mark is attracted to many different genres of music and has an eclectic compositional style – across improvisation, jazz and pop to the indigenous music of South East Asia. He is broadly interested in collisions and fusions between art, music and popular culture as a process for reconstructing the familiar.

His work has been released on nine albums including ‘A handful of rain’ – a collection of his ambient works – and his music is broadcast and performed widely in Australia.

In 2008 Mark received the AMC/APRA Classical Music State Award for long-term contribution to the Advancement of Australian Music. He continues to work on Resonating Spaces: The two Islands project in the Cook Islands, a project he pioneered in 2015. His work The Heavenly Muzak Machine has been featured at many festivals and has even toured prisons in Norway!