ABOUT & credentials

Regina Piroska (Gina)


e: blackfishartstasmania@gmail.com

  

Gina is an award-winning, multi-disciplinary artist and poet living and working in country Tasmania surrounded by native forest and paddocks. Working daily out of her Turners Beach studio, she explores the visual and tactile intersections of landscape, memory, and the natural world across painting, mono prints, collage, and slow-stitch textiles. Her daily creative practice inherently weaves literature and visual arts together, culminating in a unique approach to contemporary artist books.


Her research-driven practice examines concepts of mapping, collecting, recording, and language, frequently drawing on her Hungarian heritage and roots. Through an expressive, process-based approach—often involving deconstructing and reassembling physical mediums—Gina uses the organic metaphor of trees to explore personal narratives surrounding displacement, stability, and the mystery of "Absence and Presence."


Gina’s evocative visual art and literature have earned widespread recognition. She has been named a finalist in prestigious contemporary art prizes, including the Glover Prize, Hadley's Art Prize, the Bay of Fires Art Award, Burnie Print Prize, Crescendo Artist Book Prize, and the Mullins Conceptual Photographic Awards. 


In 2025, she was awarded the Curator's Choice Award at Stitching & Beyond. Her creative career includes artist residencies at the Cradle Mountain Wilderness Gallery, a series of successful solo exhibitions, and over 110 short-form poems published in international journals such as Modern Haiku and Eucalypt.


Curriculum Vitae
Awards & Selected Prizes

  • 2025 – Finalist, Burnie Print Prize, Burnie Arts & Function Centre, TAS
  • 2025 – Finalist, Crescendo25 Artist Book Prize, Margaret River, WA
  • 2025 – Winner, Curator's Choice Award (1st Prize), Out of Hand, Stitching & Beyond, Hobart, TAS
  • 2024 – Highly Commended, Northwest Art Circle, Devonport Regional Gallery, TAS
  • 2023 – Finalist, Bay of Fires Art Prize, St Helens, TAS
  • 2023 – Finalist, Mullins Conceptual Photographic Awards, Magnet Galleries, Melbourne, VIC
  • 2019 – Finalist, Henry Jones Art Prize, Hobart, TAS
  • 2019 – Finalist, Mullins Australian Conceptual Photography Prize, Melbourne, VIC
  • 2017 – Finalist, Hadley's Art Prize, Hadley’s Orient Hotel, Hobart, TAS
  • 2017 – Highly Commended, TASART, Burnie Regional Art Gallery, TAS
  • 2016 – Finalist, John Glover Art Award, Evandale, TAS
  • 2016 – Finalist, Material Girl Art Awards, Touring Exhibition, TAS
  • 2016 – Finalist, Bay of Fires Art Prize, St Helens, TAS
  • 2016 – Finalist, Sheffield Sculpture Prize, Sheffield, TAS
  • 2016 – Award Winner, TASART, Burnie Regional Art Gallery, TAS
  • 2015 – Major Winner, Sheffield Sculpture Prize (Judge: Geoff Dobson), Sheffield, TAS
  • 2015 – Award Winner (Mixed Media), Tasmanian Art Award, Eskleigh, TAS
  • 2015 – Finalist, Bay of Fires Art Prize, St Helens, TAS
    • Solo Exhibitions
    • 2020 – The Absence of Presence, Cradle Mountain Wilderness Gallery, TAS
    • 2020 – A Sense of Place, Portside Gallery, Devonport, TAS
    • 2018 – Down the Rabbit Hole, The Little Gallery, Devonport Regional Gallery, TAS
    • 2018 – Down the Rabbit Hole, Rosny Farm Arts Centre, Clarence, Hobart, TAS
      • Selected Group Exhibitions
      • 2026 – Annual Northwest Art Circle, Devonport Regional Gallery, TAS
      • 2025 – Out of Hand, Stitching & Beyond, Rosny Barn / Salamanca Arts Centre, Hobart, TAS
      • 2025 – Summer Salon, Poimena Gallery, Launceston, TAS
      • 2024 – North West Art Circle, Devonport Regional Gallery, TAS
      • 2021 – Minds Do Matter, RANT Arts, Launceston, TAS
      • 2021 – Group Showcase, Burnie Coastal Art Group, Burnie, TAS
      • 2017 – Rubicon River Arts, Ghost Rock Vineyard, Port Sorell, TAS
      • 2017 – Group Exhibition, Rosevears Gallery, Rosevears, TAS
      • 2017 – North West Art Circle, Devonport Regional Gallery, TAS
      • 2017 – Beth Hulme Gallery Showcase, The Quartermasters Arms, Hobart, TAS
      • 2016 – Feature Artist Group Show, Nigel Lazenby Gallery, Rosevears, TAS
      • 2016 – Rubicon River Arts, Ghost Rock Vineyard, Port Sorell, TAS
      • 2016 – Latrobe Art Exhibition, Latrobe, TAS
      • 2015, 2016 – North West Art Circle, Devonport Regional Gallery, TAS
      • 2015 – Rubicon River Arts, Ghost Rock Winery, Port Sorell, TAS

      • Artist Residencies
      • 2020 – Artist in Residence, Cradle Mountain Wilderness Gallery, TAS (2 weeks)
      • 2019 – Visiting Workshop Facilitator (Collage & Bookmaking), Fiji (2 weeks)
      • 2019 – Artist in Residence, Cradle Mountain Wilderness Gallery, TAS (3 weeks)
      • 2017 – Artist in Residence, Cradle Mountain Wilderness Gallery, TAS (3 weeks)
      • Creative Research & Studio Studies
      • 2024 – Independent Studio Research, Boat Harbour & Winnaleah Bay of Fires, TAS
      • 2021 – Visual Research Residency, Denison Beach, Bicheno, TAS
      • 2020 – Material Studies, Boat Harbour, TAS
      • 2019 – Creative Research Program for Contemporary Arts (10-Month Mentorship with Dr. Ruth Hadlow)
      • 2019 – Visual Research Intensive, Denison Beach, Bicheno, TAS

      • Selected Literary & Press Publications
      • 2026 – Finalist, Golden Triangle Haiku, Washington DC, USA
      • 2022 – 3rd Prize, Betty Drevniok Haiku Award, League of Canadian Poets, Canada
      • 2020 – Featured Collage Artist, Kolaj Magazine (International Print & Online Publication)
      • Selected Catalogues – Hadley's Art Prize (2017), Glover Prize (2016), Bay of Fires Art Prize (2015, 2016, 2023), Material Girl (2016)
      • Journal Features – IMAGE Journal (Australian Photographic Society Contemporary Division) – Special features on "Poetry in Photography" and "Haiga"
      • Arts Writing – SNAKEBITE (The Snakepit Art Space, Launceston) – Featured essays, programmatic text, and articles.
      • Poetry Credits – Author of over 150 short-form poems, haiku, and tanka published internationally across Australia, the USA, Canada, the UK, Poland, and New Zealand. Featured in The Heron’s Nest, Modern Haiku, Eucalypt, Drifting Sands, Contemporary Haibun, Kokako, Moonset, Simply Haiku, LYNX, Ripples, Cloudspeak, and The Aurora Review.
    Collections & Commercial Assets
  • Private Collections – Held in prominent private collections across Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, the United States (including New York), Canada, the United Kingdom, Malta, Italy, and Switzerland.
  • Tourism Tasmania – 8 photographic assets acquired and utilized in official state tourism destination advertising campaigns (2009–2025).

 Testimonials

I am so privileged to own this collage showcasing my favourite colour, blue. I live near the water in Tasmania, with ocean

of many moods, stacked rock strata and mysterious little pathways made by seldom seen creatures. 


This collage so perfectly expresses all I hold dear as I walk the foreshore.  (Chris)


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From my point of view, well deserved. There are many terms to describe an Image. It may be a only personal thing but what truly captivates me about an image is something i would call "quality" that I can't really describe.


But I feel it very clearly when I see it.   (Vectorian - artist forum)



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Gina has great skill and patience in delivering a satisfying workshop; liberal with instruction, suggestions and a most welcoming demeanour.

Angela


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I have done varied workshops with Gina and have always found them productive while at the same time accepting individual style .Tuition is present but not demanding, encouraging personal interpretation and expression.  I am not an artist but have always finished the lesson with an acceptable piece  and everyone at the workshop has produced something different from the same set of directions ... so interesting and so much fun and collage is the perfect medium for exploring the surreal ... anything goes !!

Margaret


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I attended an individualised workshop with Gina Fynearts at her Devonport studio early in 2018.  


I found her session planning with sequential and cumulative activities well organized and tailored to my needs and experience level. Her gentle, generous manner was both empowering and supportive – the whole day-long experience was inspiration and left me wanting more, eager to explore the Artist Within…when time permits!


I can see how some techniques can be translated to my own textile art and how I will be able to find expression in a mixed media context at some future stage.


I can recommend Gina’s workshop to anyone wanting to explore their own creativity using a variety of art mediums as Gina’s expertise crosses many mediums.


I wish Gina well in any teaching venture she may undertake.  

June


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When Gina and I set out on a year-long collaborative collage journey it proved much more than a way to have fun. 


Each month we constructed an image in one of two books, then posted it to the other artist. The guidelines were simple: add to the other person’s work until the picture appeared resolved, then, create a new image. When ready, the books were swapped again and so it continued. Quirky and highly imaginative images emerged, providing contemplation, wonder and amusement.


Our different styles complimented one another and any need to ‘own’ one’s work dissolved through a sense of sharing and artistic development. The opportunity to collaborate on a project with an artist like Gina, whose imagination and expertise in composing images that tell stories through humour and pathos was a joy. Collage is an art form that encourages artists to stretch their wings and fly to unimaginable places – working with Gina is the magic carpet that takes you there!


Lynne Fellowes. 



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Solo Exhibition 

Little Gallery Devonport Regional Gallery

Geoff Dobson - Director



There is no abstract art.

Prior to introducing the Gallery’s Curator, Erin Wilson, who will open There is no abstract art, it is my pleasure to officially open Down the Rabbit Hole, with Scissors. Our Little Gallery exhibition – opening this evening.

I first met Gina several years ago, as part of the Kentish Arts Festival. I was judging a sculpture prize, when I came across this fantastic assemblage of found bits and pieces, sensitively arranged in a small boat, a vessel. Every piece Gina had chosen to add to that sculpture was specific, and added to the overall story stemming from the piece itself. The viewer could spend time with it, and create their own story of what this vessel was, and where it was going. And why was this creature there, and that stack there, and wait, there is port hole, oh, and what is underneath…. It is the same feelings of intrigue I get when I view Gina’s collage today. 

When I visited Gina’s studio, at portside gallery, a month or so ago, I saw that sculpture again. And its fanciful magic captured my attention/imagination once again. 

Gina has a strength in composition and capacity to provide the viewer with enough, without the fear of the work being overbearing. Gina talks about making a collage a day, 200 collages a year. Making while on holiday, making while at home. Taking pieces and items of the mundane, of the disposal collateral that clogs our letter boxes, and continually makes uninterrupted.  When Erin and I visited her wonderful studio, I think we were both overwhelmed by the mass of work. It was extensive. Yet, in the space, here in the Little Gallery, Gina has again, been selective, provided enough, not to overload, but to entice the viewer in to spending time with the works, both as unique individual works, and as a mass which is work in itself. As mention, her strength is her ability to be selective, both in the assemblage of her collage, and execution of her presentation.

To look at Gina’s work, is not something you can rush, because your eye will be captivated by images relevant to you. Images you know, but are somehow different. Somehow not the same. But somehow work. I hasten to use the art wank word – recontextualize, but that is exactly what Gina has done, and Down the Rabbit Hole with Scissors is distinctly appropriate, as the title. I trust you will all have as much enjoyment with the show as I do. I congratulate Gina and declare her Little Gallery exhibition – open.


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Gina exhibited at the Schoolhouse Gallery, Rosny Farm from 31st August – 23 September 2018.

Her exhibition, “Down the Rabbit Hole with Scissors” was received very well by our gallery visitors. The collages were professionally crafted and I believe they gave viewers a new found appreciation for the art form.  Whilst diverse in style, motif and narrative, they sat together beautifully on the walls, alongside some of Gina’s very quirky assemblages.

Gina was wonderful to deal with and was open to curatorial suggestions from gallery staff. The exhibition was a positive experience for everyone involved and was a great opportunity for our visitors to experience an art form that is perhaps not so commonly seen.

I wish Gina well for her future creative endeavours.

Sarah Bishop, Gallery Coordinator, Schoolhouse Gallery 2018

 

Best wishes,

Sarah



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