Hyphenated Projects is an artist-led network nurturing practice in Asian diasporas. We focus on supporting artists who operate with the hyphens—culturally, socially and geographically. 

Situated in a suburban house in Sunshine West, Melbourne, the space supports artists, producers and researchers through an artist residency and development program since 2019. The program prioritises facilitation of supportive and critical conversations about creative diasporic practices in the Asia Pacific, and on stolen lands here in Australia. We evolve our work to facilitate projects that adapt to the shifting needs of our communities.

Hyphenated Projects was founded after presenting a survey exhibition of Asian-Australian artists in Victoria at The Substation titled Hyphenated  (2018). Since then, we have partnered and collaborated with Due West Arts Festival, Next Wave, Footscray Community Arts, ACMI, Incinerator Gallery, The Substation, fine print Magazine, and Liminal with a range of contemporary and community arts projects. In 2020-2022, we delivered our largest project to date: Hyphenated Biennial, a multi-venue exhibition across Melbourne's West. In 2023, we launched New Hyphens, a 2-year graduate residency and mentorship program. Hyphenated Projects is a winner Creative Australia’s Asia Pacific Arts Awards for Innovation in 2024.

How we work

We are a network of artists, writers, producers and friends who are committed to working towards a more equitable art world. Sometimes we are interested in complicating diasporic discourse, other times we advocate for community, most of the time we focus on creating small changes by supporting each other. And, most of the time, we gather, eat and sing ballads at karaoke.

We have the privilege to work with a lot of talented and dedicated people in our network. While we don’t usually make art collectively, we see facilitation, solidarity and bringing people together as integral collective work. At a glance we are a duo, but we are building towards a collective model that is rhizomically de-centralised.

Things can be slow at Hyphenated Projects. We work semi-regularly when the work can be remunerated. Working towards equity takes a very long time and most of the work we do is voluntary. Having said that, we welcome new collaborators who share our values to connect with us.

Co-Directors


  • Co-Director

    Nikki Lam is an artist-curator based in Naarm. Working primarily with moving images, her work explores hybridity and memory through the contemplation on time, space and impermanence. Born in Hong Kong, her work deals with the complexity of migratory expressions. With an expanded practice in writing, exhibition and festival making, she is interested in exploring anti-colonial methods in artistic and curatorial practice. Nikki is curator-at-large at The Substation. She was the Artistic Director of Channels video art festival, alongside many hybrid roles in the arts including at ACMI, Next Wave and Footscray Community Arts Centre. She is a current PhD (Art) candidate at RMIT University.

    @curiousother


  • Co-Director

    Phuong Ngo is an artist and curator living and working in Naarm (Melbourne). He is co-director of Hyphenated Projects with Nikki Lam, a PhD candidate at RMIT. His practice is concerned with the interpretation of history, memory and place, and how it impacts individual and collective identity. Through an archival process rooted in a conceptual practice, he seeks to find linkages between culture, politics and oral histories and historic events.

    @pthngo

Support

We can’t do this work without the generous support from our peers and communities. We would like to thank the Sidney Myer Fund (2022-23), Creative Victoria (2022) and our private supporters for contributing to a more sustainable practice at Hyphenated Projects.

If you would like to support our work, please get in touch with us.