VWA Artists in Residence Update October 2025
Our Artists in Residence are continually working new projects and we’re excited to share their updates. For this update, we start with our newest resident Margot Feast, who already has plenty to share.
Margot Feast
From table to console?
“Along with setting up my space at VWA I am working on finishing a bespoke design side table in spotted gum for a client.
For the curved legs of this table I have been finessing my skills on the router table – with the end grain proving a challenge.
The legs of this table have me quite transfixed, so I am playing with the idea of extending them length ways to create a console table.”
Follow Margot on instagram here.
Emily McCrae
Planning Ahead
“I recently restored a Stanley jack-plane and have been having fun trying to improve my planning skills. I managed to steal some time to make a shooting board to use with it (and also made one for my block plane!).
I’m looking forward to spending some time with it and improving the quality of finish on end grain.”
Follow Emily on instagram here.
Wanda Gillespie
Holding Hope
Emerging from burnt landscapes—where charred trunks rise like sentinels and green shoots break through blackened bark—this sculpture inhabits a threshold between ruin and renewal.
Hand-carved in wood, the work insists on slowness. In a time of collapse and acceleration, carving becomes an act of resistance. The sculpture might be read as a contemporary totem—open, provisional, resonant. It reflects a global condition of displacement, whether environmentally driven, or through senseless war, where communities move through aftermath carrying what they can.
Within its stillness lies momentum—a reflection on resilience not as triumph, but as the capacity to adapt, endure, and hold space for hope.
Wanda has recently started to share her love of carving with two new Class Bento:
Wanda’s Carving Classes
Follow Wanda on instagram here.
Caleb Biffanti
Precision
Lately I’ve been using my time in the workshop to build skills, test a couple ideas, and get familiar with techniques I’ve only passed – or seen online.
Recently I finished another version of my Oregon side table, a tall coaster. Maybe this one’s an extra-tall coaster. The plan is to have both versions photographed properly – to see them in context, behaving in space, and then put out into the world.
I’ve also been making a small box – maybe simply just a box for private things. It’s part test piece, part study in precision (though the precision feels more aspirational than actual). Still, it’s been a quiet exercise in how separate parts come together, the importance of planning (or lack thereof), and how to correct slight inaccuracies that pop up along the way.
Pointed studies such as this this feel like good company right now and will keep me busy for the next little while – modest in scale or complexity, but generous in how they might contribute to larger ideas and pieces of work.
Follow Caleb on instagram here.
Freddy Mata
Grainchromie
Latest series coming out of the workshop is these five pieces of what I am calling Grainchromie.
Grainchromie is Natural pattern of end grain enhanced with colour embedded memories and architectural dreams.
In this series we found five places/moments represented in geometrical abstraction and coloured patterns from sounds and lights.
Pieces are:
1) Melbourne CBD
Based on CBD grid orientation and lighting tribute to honour the legacy of Prince (the musician) following his death in 2016.
2) Opera Arca
Inspired by the sound waves coming out of the speakers of the Venezuelan artist ARCA in her first show in Australia at the Sydney Opera House during the VIVID Sydney 2024.
3) Southbank
Interpretation of all the different Architecture styles and egos colliding in Southbank VIC 3006. The rapid growth of the area does not allow us to understand how buildings were never communicating to each other 15 years ago but somehow by the time the completion of building 108 in Southbank Boulevard there was a click, and now the area has its own identity.
4) Carlton Gardens
An appreciation of a good stroll around the gardens and the Royal Exhibition Building as main characters. The views from the front facade side are surrounded by tall trees like green walls and the water fountain. The space between the REB and the Melbourne Museum completely changed the colour palette to a more grey urban/industrial look. Two different experiences in the same garden
5) ACCA
This is my favourite building in Melbourne since I found it out in 2012 when I first visited it. Shape speaks for itself and colours are a tribute to all the contemporary art exhibitions I have seen inside the building.
The pictures are not labeled with the names of the pieces, I thought it will be fun to try to identify them by the descriptions or keep an eye on my IG marateka.xyz to discover which one is what as I am posting them.
Follow Freddy on instagram here.