Christopher Köller trained as a silk-screen printer and then inspired by the Beat writers and an intense curiosity, travelled extensively throughout the late 1960s and ’70s. He returned to Australia to study photography at Prahran under Athol Shmith and John Cato, and after graduating lived in Japan where he took photos and became immersed in the world of Japanese gardens and bonsai from 1983-4.

Köller has held solo exhibitions of his photographs, installations and video works in various Australian cities and in Japan, England, Spain and Mexico. His work has been included in group-exhibitions in France, Italy, Spain, and throughout Australia. The Visual Arts Board has awarded Köller two grants and he has been accepted for four residencies, the most recent, in Barcelona in 2008. Köller’s work is held in the collections of the National Gallery of Australia, the National Gallery of Victoria, the City of Monash, Griffith University, the Bibliotheque Nationale of France and the Sata Corporation Collection, Tokyo.

In 2002 Köller completed a Masters Degree in Fine Art at RMIT and he lectured in photography at the Victorian College of the Arts until 2009. Since 2010 Köller has been focusing exclusively on his practice.

Read interviews with Christopher Koller at Fierce Latitudes & Lucida Magazine.

GRANTS

2007 Barcelona Studio Residency, Australia Council.
2006 Artists’ Grant, City of Melbourne & Tokyo Studio Residency, Australia Council.
1996 Milan Studio Residency, Australia Council.
1993 Los Angeles Studio Residency, Australia Council.
1988 Half Standard Grant, Australia Council & Travel Grant, Australia Council.

COLLECTIONS

National Gallery of Australia.
National Gallery of Victoria.
Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris.
SATA Corporation Collection, Tokyo.
Monash Gallery of Art Collection, Melbourne.
Consejo Mexicano de Fotografia, Mexico City.
Griffith University, Queensland.

PUBLICATIONS

Parádeisos. 90 page full colour monograph published by M33. [purchase]

PRIZES

2014 Bowness Prize finalist, Monash Gallery of Art, Melbourne

SOLO EXHIBITIONS

2016 Gardens 1997-2007, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne.
2015 Crossing the Line: From Polliwogs to Shellbacks, LUMA, Melbourne.
2015 Portraits in Black and White 1980-2015, Strange Neighbour, Melbourne.
2015 Isola Bella, Fehily Contemporary, Melbourne.
2013 No Fuss No Tears, Fehily Contemporary, Melbourne.
2012 Parádeisos, Centre For Contemporary Photography, Melbourne.
2012 Milano, Fehily Contemporary, Melbourne.
2012 Screen Test 508, Screen Space, Melbourne. [visit site]
2011 Parádeisos, Queensland Centre for Photography, Brisbane.
2011 Parádeisos, Beam Contemporary, Melbourne. [visit site]
2010 Killing Time, Kings Artist-Run Initiative, Melbourne.
2009 A One Legged School Teacher, Two Anarchist Bullfighters and a Poet, Seventh, Melbourne.
2008 Trust, Upstairs Flinders, Melbourne.
2008 The Living Get the Chicken, The Dead Get the Hole, FotoFreo festival, Old Fremantle Jail, Western Australia.
2007 Floating Worlds, RMIT Gallery, Melbourne.
2007 Gardens 1997-2007, Monash Gallery of Art, Melbourne.
2006 Mizuno D301, Centre for Contemporary Photography, Melbourne.
2005 A Time to Die, Kings Artist Run Initiative, Melbourne.
2004 Late Autumn, John Buckly Fine Art, Melbourne.
2003 Aberrant, 69 Smith Street, Melbourne.
2001 Loop, Conical Contemporary Art Space, Melbourne.
2000-2002 Spatial Narratives 3 – Mexico City : Milano, Melbourne, October Site 01, Richmond, Vic.Bendigo Art Gallery, Bendigo, Vic., Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts, WA, Milano, Blu Pols, Prahran, Vic., Albury Regional Art Gallery, New South Wales.
1999 Milano, Temple Studios, Melbourne.
1996 Spatial Narratives, Scope Gallery, Melbourne.
1995 Always Your Pal, Scope Gallery, Melbourne.
1991-1992 Tlacolmiquiztli, City Gallery, Melbourne, Australian Centre for Photography, Sydney.
1989 Consejo Mexicano de Fotografia, Mexico City, Mexico.
1988 Before the Winter Gardens, United Artists' Gallery, Melbourne.
1988 Australian Centre for Photography, Sydney.
1988 Portfolio Gallery, London.
1986 United Artists' Gallery, Melbourne.
1985 The Australian Centre for Photography, Sydney.
1985 The Developed Image Gallery, Adelaide.
1984 Photo Gallery International, Tokyo.
1984 Zen Zen Chigau, Photographers' Gallery, Melbourne.
1983 Gallery Dot, Kyoto.
1981 Photographers' Gallery, Melbourne.

GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2016 Sanctuary, Glen Eira City Council Gallery, Melbourne.
2015 37º Sur a 19º Norte: Fotografia contemporánea de Australia, Museo de la Ciudad de Cuernavaca, Mexico.
2013 Going Nowhere, Boxcopy, Brisbane.
2012 Kindness/Udarta, Australia-India Cultural Exchange, Visual Arts Gallery New Delhi / RMIT Gallery Melbourne.
2012 The War: The Reconstruction of Trauma, Bristol Biennale, Bristol UK.
2011 Project11: Paradise…a Hell of a Place, Anna Pappas Gallery, Melbourne.
2011 The Long & the Short of It, Federation Square Big Screen, Melbourne.
2011 Milano, Margaret Lawrence Gallery, VCA, Melbourne.
2011 Contemporary Landscapes, Colour Factory Gallery, Melbourne.
2010 Unrepresented, 45 Downstairs, Melbourne.
2009 World One Minutes Exhibition, São Paolo, Brazil.
2008 World One Minutes Exhibition, Today Art Museum, Beijing, China.
2007 Echo: Sounding Out Contemporary Photography, Deloitte, Melbourne.
2007 Always on my Mind, TCB, Melbourne.
2006 PROJECT, Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts, Perth.
2006 Winter Walling, Westspace Gallery, Melbourne.
2006 Making the Familiar Strange, Zoo, Port Melbourne.
2006 One for the Other, TCB, Melbourne.
2006 Vidi Festival 06, First International Festival of Video Art Valencia, Spain. Art in Evolution, La Sala Naranja, International Festival of Video Art, Valencia, Spain
2005 Loaded, Gallery 101, Melbourne. The Bottom Line, Span Gallery, Melbourne.
2003 Art + Film, Centre for Contemporary Photography, Melbourne.
2003 Bid for Freedom, Glen Eira Gallery, Melbourne. Contemporary Photographers, Smyrnios Gallery, Melbourne. Other Views, Griffith University, Queensland College of the Arts. Transit Narratives, Villa Letitzia, Treviso & Auronzo di Cadore, Italy. Queensland College of the Arts(2003), Victorian College of the Arts(2003).
1999-2000 Striking, Photography From the MGA. Old Treasury, Melbourne. Bicentennial Art Gallery, Cambelltown City, NSW. Bendigo Art Gallery.
1999-2000 Mildura Arts Centre. Geelong Art Gallery. Gippsland Art Gallery.
1999 Ararat: A Community in Focus, Ararat City Gallery.
1999 Recuerdos de Mexico, Blu Pols, Melbourne.
1999 Photography from the Monash Gallery of Art, Old Treasury, Melbourne.
1998 The Contemporary Imagination, Waverley City Gallery, Melbourne.
1998 The William Heimerman Collection, Photographers' Gallery, Melbourne.
1997 What's New, Waverley City Gallery, Melbourne.
1995 Intro, Scope Gallery, Melbourne.
1995 Christmas 1995; Small Works, Scope Gallery, Melbourne.
1993 Immortality: A Re-examination of the Hero, Centre for Photography, Melbourne.
1993 Gathering: Griffith University Art Collection, Griffith,Queensland.
1992 For my Part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go, I travel for travel's sake, the great affair is to move, Victorian Centre for Photography, Melbourne.
1992 Conrad Jupiter's Art Prize, Gold Coast City Art Gallery, Queensland.
1992 Then and Now, Box Hill Community Ats Centre, Melbourne.
1992 New Acquisitions, Waverley Art Gallery, Melbourne.
1991-92 A Constructed Reality, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne.
1991 Photodeath, Australian National Gallery, Canberra.
1991 Artists' Portrait of Artists, Victorian Centre for Photography, Melbourne.
1990 Waverley Collection, Waverley City Gallery, Melbourne.
1990-91 Twenty Contemporary Photographers, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne; Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney ; The Exhibitions Gallery Wangaratta; Orange Regional Gallery & Newcastle Regional Gallery.
1988 The Thousand Mile Stare, Victorian Centre for Photography Project, Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, Melbourne.
1987 Pictures I'd Bought if I'd Had the Money, Photographer's Gallery, Melbourne.
1986 Public Language, The Performance Space, Sydney.
1985 Japanese Exhibition, The Gallery, Adelaide University.
1982 Galeria Uficio del Arte, Paris.
1979 Student Exhibition, Photographer's Gallery, Melbourne.


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