The Ultimo Project - about us

The Ultimo Project is a collective of artists originally from Ultimo, hence the name, but now with a permanent home at Huts 24 and 15 in the Addison Road Centre, 142 Addison Rd Marrickville Sydney. See below for the full back ground and listing of artists. Contact is Sue Nettlefold on tel 0408 285 235.

THE ULTIMO PROJECT Incorporated

The ULTIMO PROJECT artists’ studios evolved out of the artists’ space movements of the late nineteen seventies and early nineteen eighties. These were loose collectives of artists working with an initiative from the Artworkers Union aimed towards securing affordable housing and studio spaces for artists.

The Ultimo Project itself began in 1985 and became an incorporated Association in 1988. The organisation is managed by a voluntary committee of president, secretary, treasurer and up to six ordinary members and is generally self-funded. There have, however, been three or four instances of small amounts of financial assistance from the Australia Council for the Arts since the group’s inception. The group began in Ultimo (thus the name), then moved to Hereford Street, Glebe for six years. They then moved to Coulson Street, Erskineville for eight and a half years and three years ago moved again, taking up occupancy of premises at Addison Road Centre, Marrickville.

The aim of the Association since formation has remained primarily to function as a model studio, providing long-term, secure and affordable work spaces for member artists. The organisation currently has twenty fully occupied studios (some shared) with a long waiting list.

Many prominent artists started at the Ultimo Project studios. Artists have traditionally thrived in inner city areas such as Darlinghurst, Glebe and Newtown, valuing the older industrial parts of Sydney where rents were affordable and spaces not pristine. As such spaces are rapidly disappearing from the inner city due to gentrification and development, the serious scarcity of work space for Sydney’s artists remains an issue of major concern.

The Addison Road Centre is one of the few remaining locations close to the city where artists’ studios can exist, and provides (due to it’s history, other tenants and the centre’s physical attributes) a “natural” home for an artistic community. It presents an opportunity and a location that the Ultimo Project artists intend to develop for many years to come, building a greater focus for the increasing number of arts practitioners in the Marrickville Local Government Area.

The Ultimo Project artists comprise furniture makers, fabric artists, sculptors, painters, photographers, installation artists and more.

The Ultimo Project operates a small exhibition space (the UP Gallery), mainly for the use of members, but made available on a strictly limited basis to selected other artists or groups.

Current members of the Ultimo project are:

Barbara Licha, Gail Kenning, Nicole Ellis, Therese Kenyon, Jan Fieldsend, Carolyn Brady, Geoff Levitus, Jenny Levitus, Geoff Hague, Robert Hawkins, Adam Laerkesen, Daniel Brown, Todd McCoy, Graham Byrne, Sue Pedley, Paul Miller, Sylvia Guenther, Jane Eagger, Wayne Hutchins, Annie Aitken, Sue Nettlefold, Mark Dubner, Peter Schell and Janelle Humphreys.

For further information, contact Sue Nettlefold (Secretary) on 0408 285 235.

Examples of work from 3 of our collective of 20 plus artists below