Elisa Jane Carmichael is a multidisciplinary artist who honours her salt-water heritage by incorporating materials collected from Country, embracing traditional techniques, and expressing contemporary adaptations through painting, weaving, and textiles. Born in 1987, Carmichael is a Ngugi woman from Quandamooka Country (Moreton/Moorgumpin and Stradbroke Island/Minjerribah, Queensland). She is passionate about nurturing and preserving her strong connection to the sand and sea, Yoolooburrabee.

Carmichael completed a Master of Fine Art at QUT (2017). She subsequently presented her research at Oxford University (UK) and has been published in national and international publications. In 2020 Elisa was commissioned to make new works for Tarnathi, the annual celebration of contemporary Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art and a flagship program of the Art Gallery of South Australia.  In 2018–19, Carmichael was included in the Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art’s (QAGOMA) signature exhibition, Asia Pacific Triennial 9, was a finalist in the Telstra NATSIAA Awards, and had work acquired by many institutional collections from her second solo exhibition Will we swim together tomorrow through the Saltwater waves?

Significant public art commissions include a collaboration with Judy Watson on tow row (2016), commissioned to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the QAGOMA. She made work for the Brisbane City Council’s Black History Month MAIWAR Project in July 2016. With CREATIVEMOVE, Carmichael developed the mural we are here for the Wellington Point Village Green (2016). She was also commissioned to create QYAC Temporary Banners (2017) and a Quandamooka Festival Train Wrap for Queensland Rail and a Gilimbaa Window Space (both 2018) to promote the annual Quandamooka Festival on Stradbroke Island.

Carmichael’s work is held in the collections of QAGOMA (Brisbane), National Gallery of Victoria (Melbourne, University of Queensland Art Museum (Brisbane), Queensland University of Technology Art Museum (Brisbane), Griffith University Art Museum (Brisbane), Queensland Museum (Brisbane), Sunshine Coast University (Buderim), Redland Art Gallery (Cleveland), the Quandamooka Yoolooburrabee Aboriginal Corporation (Stradbroke Island), and Lady Cilento Children’s Hospital (Brisbane).