Nicole Crosswell: AMPLIFIED! by Frazer Campbell

Nicole Crosswell is a Brisbane botanical illustrator and curator whose relationship with the city is, in artist Frazer Campbell’s words, “both intimate and expansive.” She moves between the Herbarium, the Botanic Gardens, outdoor public sites and her own garden studio. Through sustained engagement with local plant life and seasonal cycles, her botanical practice maps what Campbell describes as “a quiet but insistent form of urban stewardship.”

Her teaching work with disability communities reflects the same values, careful attention and a belief in the transformative power of art. As curator of Brisbane City Council’s AMPLIFY ME! outdoor gallery exhibition celebrating artists who live with disability, she has brought that commitment to public visibility.

Campbell, an emerging Brisbane artist and former mentee of Crosswell’s, painted her amid the energy of that work. His Long Neck series, a pantheon of memorable and dynamic creative women, is also featured in the same exhibition, making this a portrait of two artists at the heart of the same community.