Painting
Silvia At The Optometrist #2
Silvia At The Optometrist #1
What Remains #1
What Remains #2
What Remains #1 & #2
Jade Sarita Arnott is a Melbourne/Naarm-based artist working across painting and photography. Her practice explores intimacy, sensation and perception.
Her paintings begin with lived encounters and moments of feeling. Arnott is interested in how something felt might move into painting, and in the possibility of an image being sensed through the body before it is interpreted through the mind.
Moving between abstraction and representation, each work holds both a trace of the initial encounter and something of the experience of its making. A lived encounter begins the work, but a second encounter happens through the embodied act of painting.
Through pouring, layering, wiping away, blending and gestural strokes, the paintings accumulate histories of duration and touch. Natural extract pigments bring their own material presence to the surface, while oil paint contrasts with their fluidity and unpredictability. Sensations are layered rather than resolved, allowing the work to unfold over time.
Arnott's photographic practice extends this interest in embodied perception. Using intuitive movement and long exposure, she explores photography as a way of entering other states of consciousness. The body shifts between presence and dissolution, producing images that hover between the recognisable and the abstract.
Across both painting and photography, Arnott is interested in the possibility of an image being experienced through the body before it is understood through the mind.
Prior to returning to visual art she spent two decades working in fashion as the founder and creative director of Arnsdorf. Her work is held in the permanent collection of the National Gallery of Victoria.
Education
2026–present: Victorian College of the Arts, University of Melbourne - Master of Contemporary Art
2015: Pratt Institute of Design, New York - Product Design I
2012–2013: International Centre for Photography (ICP), New York - Photography I & II; Finding Your Voice as a Photographer; Lightroom; Photoshop
2002–2004: RMIT University - Bachelor of Design (Fashion)
1997–2000: Victorian College of the Arts, University of Melbourne - Bachelor of Creative Arts (Visual Arts Major)
Exhibitions & Presentations
2026: UMSU Art Prize, George Paton Gallery
2026: GSA Art Prize, Potter Museum of Art
2026: Polaroid Polaroid Polaroid, Group Show, Mars Gallery
2023: Melbourne Now, National Gallery of Victoria (participation and works acquired for permanent collection)
2022: Chairity Project, Cult Design / HAY House, Melbourne Design Week
2021: NGV Teens: Arnsdorf – What Is Sustainable Fashion? Workshop & Talk, NGV Online
2018: You Can't Do That, Melbourne Museum (participation and works acquired for permanent collection)
2016–2024: Melbourne Fashion Week, Runway Shows & Presentations
2016–2023: Melbourne Fashion Festival, Runway Shows
2010–2012: New York Fashion Week, Paris Fashion Week
2008–2012: Australian Fashion Week, Runway Presentations
2000: Between Underpaints and Overcoats, Group Show, George Paton Gallery
Collections
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne - Permanent Collection
Melbourne Museum - Permanent Collection
Talks & Panels (Selected)
2021: NGV Teens – What Is Sustainable Fashion?, NGV Online Workshop & Talk
2020: Making Fashion Circular, Good Thing Australia Panel, Melbourne
2020: Building a Business for Better, B Corp Month Webinar, Portable, Melbourne
2019: Break the Business Model, Melbourne Design Week, Presented by NGV
2019: Sustainability in Fashion, Inn Talks Panel, Paddo Inn, Sydney
2018: Fashion FOMO, NGV Triennial Extra, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Publications & Media (Selected)
Features and interviews in: Vogue Australia, Harper's Bazaar, Elle, Russh, The Australian, The Age, The Herald Sun, Wish Magazine, Grey Magazine (UK), Nylon (US), Habitus, Broadsheet, Fashion Journal, Refinery29, Marie Claire, and The Guardian Australia.
2010: Profile feature published in FASHION: Australian and New Zealand Designers (Thames & Hudson)
Professional Practice
Founder, Creative Director and Designer, Arnsdorf (2006–2012, 2016–2024) - Contemporary womenswear label; first major Australian fashion label to achieve B Corp certification (2019); Winner, National Designer Award for Sustainability (2019).
Industry Advisory Committee, School of Fashion and Textiles, RMIT University (2019–present)
Consultancy & Editorial (2012–2016) - Consultant for Apiece Apart and SVbscription (New York); Correspondent for Vogue Australia.
Location
Melbourne, Australia
Studio
Studio visits by appointment.