Lutruwita/Tasmania, Australia
Samara McIlroy
Socially-engaged artist · Community storyteller · Digital information consultant
“Through sharing our stories we create meaning, nurture identity, preserve legacies, celebrate community, and cultivate a sense of belonging to the world.”
About
With a background in fine arts and a deep commitment to socially-engaged practice, I bring together skills in archives, sculpture, painting, photography, curation, and digital media to make creative work that celebrates people, places, and shared histories.
My artistic approach is deeply collaborative. I thrive on engaging with people of all ages to uncover stories, transform them into visually expressive works, and curate meaningful legacies — from digital storytelling workshops in remote and regional areas to cross-generational art installations and public conversations.
I am also a practising End of Life Doula and the author of Digital Afterlife, a Substack newsletter exploring digital legacy, memory, and what we leave behind.
Alongside my creative practice, I run a consulting business specialising in digital information management, archival systems, and explainable AI implementation for small businesses and community organisations. I live in Launceston, and work nationally.
I offer creative mentoring and coaching for passion projects that matter – preserving family stories, facilitating community place-making, or organising your legacy through end-of-life planning and digital archives.
Featured Projects
Working at the intersection of community storytelling, ecological practice, and creative facilitation, projects spanning socially-engaged installations, collaborative permaculture, digital archives, and community workshops.
2025 Celebrate Swansea | Community Art Workshops for Town Entry Features
Designed and facilitated a series of community art workshops for Swansea Chamber of Commerce as part of their Town Entry Features Project — an initiative to raise the town’s profile through celebratory infrastructure highlighting its unique character.
Workshops engaged primary school students (Years 2–6) and a local adult art group at the Swansea Courthouse, using creative storytelling and visual arts to generate ideas rooted in community pride. Children created illustrated ‘treasure maps’, stencil art, and banners featuring coastline, fishing heritage, and wildlife. Adults sculpted Swansea icons from air clay using driftwood, shells, and found materials.
Impact: The workshops catalysed lasting community action: ‘Postcards from Swansea’ post boxes appeared at local cafés, the community built a giant swan float for the Christmas parade, and an exhibition is planned for 2026.
2025 Empowering Creativity in Government | Tasmanian Style! — Creative Bureaucracy Festival
Organised Tasmania’s contribution to the inaugural Creative Bureaucracy Festival Hub for Australia and New Zealand – a grassroots movement empowering public sector innovation and creative problem-solving. This entirely voluntary, unfunded initiative brought together 14 events across 9 cities.
Coordinated simultaneous evening gatherings in Launceston and Hobart at local craft breweries, creating accessible, informal spaces for public servants and collaborators to share survival strategies and explore innovative approaches to systemic challenges.
Impact: Demonstrated that transformative public sector engagement doesn’t require institutional permission or funding, just committed individuals willing to create space for honest conversation.
2024 Digital Storytelling Workshops | Live Well Tasmania – Healthy & Thriving Neighbourhoods
Designed and facilitated digital storytelling workshops for Live Well Tasmania, using storytelling as a tool for personal growth, community connection, and collective action – building capacity designed to outlast the grant funding.
Developed a ‘train the trainer’ model empowering community members to continue digital storytelling practice independently. Workshops combined online preparation with intensive in-person sessions across Northwest Tasmania.
Impact: Created sustainable digital storytelling infrastructure, training facilitators rather than simply delivering workshops.
2019–2024 Can’t We Just Talk? | Art, Permaculture & Ecological Grief
An independent research project exploring how permaculture principles and socially-engaged artmaking can combine as a restorative practice for ecological grief and climate anxiety. Originally conceived as an Honours project at the University of Tasmania, this five-year investigation was completed independently following COVID disruptions and the death of my mother.
Fieldwork methods included diagramming, storytelling, gardening, photography, video, audio recording, and site-specific installations using natural, found, and recycled materials.
Impact: Demonstrated that ‘small and slow’ site-specific actions, grounded in permaculture ethics, can function as both art practice and climate action.
2023 Bob’s Body of Knowledge | Collaborative Land Stories for Succession Planning
When my father needed to plan succession for the Wallaby Rocks property in Far East Gippsland, I created a series of digital land stories transforming nearly five decades of embodied knowledge into living legacy documents.
Walking the land together, I recorded his insights about soil management, water systems, fruit tree cultivation, and the adapted Keyline methods he had developed since moving to Victoria in 1972.
Impact: Revealed that the ultimate act of land stewardship is knowledge transfer. The videos serve as working documents for future land managers while honouring the intimacy between a person and place developed over a lifetime.
2010–2013 (f)route | Art, Food & Place-Making in East Gippsland
A pioneering regional arts project weaving together art practice, local food systems, and community conversations across remote East Gippsland. As one of the founding collaborators, I helped shape (f)route from initial conversations in 2010 into a flourishing movement.
Key contributions included the PASSIONfruit Pop-up Community Museum at Taste of Tubbut, a residency journey collecting oral histories, digital storytelling workshops, and The Locavore Travel Agency bee-box installation for the 2013 (f)routeville festival.
Impact: Demonstrated how art, food, and conversation can revitalise regional communities and create new frameworks for valuing local knowledge.
Consulting
Practical, values-driven consulting for organisations that want to do things properly. I can help you get your archives in order, implement AI thoughtfully, or plan for what comes next.
Archives & Information Management
Strategic information and records management consulting for government, community, and cultural organisations. Specialising in digital preservation, collection assessment, policy development, and practical systems and workflows for managing information assets over time.
Online and on-site engagements
Accountable AI for Small Organisations
Practical, no-jargon AI implementation for small businesses and community organisations. Currently piloting agentic AI workflows for administrative tasks, community engagement, and knowledge management. Helping organisations work smarter without losing their human touch.
Online and on-site engagements
Digital Legacy & End-of-Life
As a trained End of Life Doula and professional archivist, I offer a distinctive practice at the intersection of end-of-life planning and digital legacy. I help individuals and families get their digital affairs in order. Practical tools to manage accounts, devices, passwords, and the stories worth keeping. My Digital Afterlife publication offers a good starting point if you’re stuck.
Online engagements
Available for new engagements · Online and on-site across Australia
Academic Background
| 2011 | BFA: (Sculpture) | University of Tasmania |
| 2008 | Diploma of Arts (Painting) | Centre for Adult Education, Melbourne |
| 2007 | Preventative Care of Photographs & Film | University of Melbourne |
| 1999 | Cert IV in Fine Arts | North Sydney Institute of TAFE |
| 1994 | BAppSci: (Photography) | RMIT University |
Selected Works
A career-spanning record of exhibitions, projects, workshops, residencies, publications, and community initiatives.
2025
- StoryKeepers oral history interviews (ASA 50th anniversary project)
- Celebrate Swansea: Community Art Workshops for Town Entry Features
- Empowering Creativity in Government – Tasmanian Style!, Launceston & Hobart (Creative Bureaucracy Festival Australia & New Zealand)
2014–2024
- Digital Storytelling workshops – Live Well Tasmania, Wynyard (online and in-person)
- Archival tendencies, uncanny knowledge: Fireside Chat with Dr Nancy Mauro-Flude, Auto-luminescence Institute Digital Caretaking series
- RADMIN (in your livelihood), creative program with Kate Rich and Chiz Williams
- DreamJob: Virtual Job Simulation Platform (VISP) – published in Journal, Contemporary Art Tasmania
- Community Economies Practice Retreat, Vallagarina Valley, Italy
- Bob’s Body of Knowledge (BBOK): Collaborative digital land-stories for succession planning, Wallaby Rocks, Victoria
- Can’t We Just Talk? permaculture and art-making as restorative practice for ecological grief
- Bimblebox: art – science – nature, touring exhibition, Museums & Galleries Queensland / Redland Art Gallery
2010–2013
- Cabanandra Dreaming – research blog documenting off-grid eco-retreat design, mobile structures, and ecological living, Far East Gippsland
- economy studio – shared post-studio practice, Bank Arcade, Hobart (with Laura Hindmarsh, Benjamin Ryan, Aden Narkowicz, Pip Stafford; site-responsive and dematerialised work)
- The Locavore Travel Agency (pop-up project), (f)routeville, East Gippsland
- PARK(ing) Day pop-ups, various sites, Hobart
- Document://Bimblebox (Curator), Sawtooth ARI, Launceston
- Engagement: a dialogue – Project/residency, Inflight ARI Hobart & Open Engagement, Portland, Oregon
- Digital Storytelling workshops (facilitator), Tubbut, Goongerah & Swifts Creek, East Gippsland
- (f)route artist-in-residence and artistic co-director, East Gippsland
- O-Cult (collaboration with Anna Cocks & Joel Crosswell), performed at MONA, Hobart
- Happily Ever After: Alternative destinies in contemporary feminine narratives, John Paynter Gallery Newcastle & CAMPSITE, Entrepot Gallery Hobart
2002–2009
- hereNOW collective – community technology blog; contributor to The Pop-Up City online magazine, Amsterdam
- Digital Storytelling, ACMI, Melbourne
- ArtLab Professional Development with Robert Mangion, City of Brimbank
- Memories of the Heidelberg Town Hall – multimedia and event-based collaboration with Julian Holcroft
- Not just pretty pictures: Creating digital surrogates of historical photographs for preservation and access – conference paper, ASA Annual Conference, Perth
- Local government collections and the community: collaborations and connections – conference paper, ASA Annual Conference, Alice Springs
Contact
Let’s work together
I’m always interested in hearing about new projects, commissions, collaborations, and consulting opportunities. If you’re a community organisation, government body, small business, or individual with a story you want to tell creatively – get in touch.
I’d love to talk about
- Community art projects & workshops
- Digital storytelling facilitation
- Archives & information consulting
- Accountable agentic AI implementation
- Digital legacy & end-of-life planning
- Creative mentoring & coaching
- Speaking & public engagement
Samara McIlroy 