Lani Balzan
National Award and Multiple Award winning artist.
Over the past decade, Lani Balzan has established herself as a leading Aboriginal artist, celebrated for her vibrant, culturally significant works that pay tribute to her Wiradjuri heritage. Her artistic journey has been characterised by a deep dedication to preserving and promoting Indigenous culture, using her unique visual storytelling style.
In 2016, Lani gained national recognition when she won the prestigious National NAIDOC Poster Competition with her artwork Songlines Tie All Aboriginal People Together. This piece captured the 2016 NAIDOC theme, "Songlines: The Living Narrative of Our Nation", which highlighted the ancestral pathways connecting Aboriginal people to the land and to one another. This achievement placed Lani in the spotlight, solidifying her as a prominent figure in Aboriginal art.
Since then, Lani has continued to create a wide range of artworks across different mediums, combining traditional Aboriginal techniques like dot painting with modern digital art. A skilled graphic designer, she has created numerous digital and vector-based pieces for corporate and community projects, including Reconciliation Action Plans (RAPs) for organisations such as the Productivity Commission and QLeave. Her artworks often centre around themes of community, self-determination, and reconciliation, using symbols representing gatherings, unity, and cultural continuity.
Lani's artistic reach extends into the world of sport, where she has collaborated with the St. George Illawarra Dragons to design Indigenous Round jerseys. By embedding cultural stories into such prominent platforms, she aims to foster greater awareness and appreciation of Aboriginal culture, both within Australia and beyond.
In addition to her corporate and sports collaborations, Lani continues to explore her deep connection to family, culture, and Country through her personal works. Her Wiradjuri heritage and family play an integral role in her life, and she uses her art to share cultural stories, celebrating Aboriginal identity while also encouraging dialogue about social justice and Indigenous rights.
Through her dedication to both her artistic practice and her community, Lani Balzan has become an influential figure in contemporary Aboriginal art. Her works from the past 10 years reflect a passionate commitment to preserving her culture and advocating for the empowerment of First Nations people
2016 NADIOC "Songlines" Artwork
My artwork titled "Songlines" was selected as the winner and used throughout Australia to celebrate NAIDOC week.
“Dreaming stories are presented as elaborate song cycles (Songlines) that relate to a specific place, group or individual.
Dreamtime ancestors made Songlines as part of the creation story to provide a map of the landscape, and represent the relationships between the lands, the sea and the people.
The painting represents all of the songlines coming together to create our nation. You can see how they criss-cross the land as they run east, west, north, south, and diagonally across the country to track the journeys of our ancestors”.