Kylie Belling

Kylie is a Yorta Yorta/Wiradjuri/ South Sea Islander woman born and raised on Kulin Country.

She is a Victorian College of the Arts graduate, a qualified Secondary School Teacher and holds a Master of Public Health. She is currently conducting doctoral research on decolonising a Victorian First Peoples Theatre ecology.

Kylie has been actively involved in the Victorian Aboriginal community for over thirty years working exclusively within the Aboriginal affairs sector as an Aboriginal community controlled and not-for-profit sector manager and educator and as a public servant who has worked across the health and human services, children and youth, women, justice, education and arts portfolios.

Kylie has an ongoing relationship with the Victorian First Peoples Creative industries where after a long successful career as an Actor interpreter across theatre, film and television, proceeded to establish Ilbijerri Theatre Co-operative as a co-founder and its inaugural Artistic Director.

Kylie has received many awards, including a Deadly Arts Award for Outstanding Achievement in Literature; Koorie Women Mean Business – Women in Art Award; Sidney Myer Indigenous Individual Arts Award and an Ilbijerri Uncle Bob Maza Memorial Arts Award. These honours reflect both her artistic excellence and her broader cultural leadership.

As well as being a past and current board member of Djirra, Kylie has also served many arts and community organisations, including being a member of the First Nations Strategic Council at the National Gallery of Victoria. In 2019 Kylie was inducted as an inaugural ‘Djirra Keeper’. She lists her greatest production as her daughter, Sofii Claire Dominini Yalka Belling Harding, who has also recently blessed her with granddaughter, Dunguludja Mulana.