Daniel Boyd seeks to negotiate the identity of art, history and cultural survival through his investigations of oppressed and colonial culture.

With his complex and divergent works spanning an array of historical references from landscape and Western-style portraiture to the traditions of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, Daniel Boyd seeks to negotiate the identity of art, history and cultural survival through his investigations of oppressed and colonial culture. His questioning of what is defined as history blends seamlessly into the confluence of his work, where he brings to the forefront the often overlooked and discarded history of his Aboriginal ancestors. “We have the oldest continuous culture on earth and it's important to celebrate that,” said Boyd.

Daniel Boyd was born in 1982 in Cairns. Now a resident of Sydney, Boyd studied art at the Australian National University’s School of Art & Design in Canberra. His heritage spans several Nations including Kudjala, Ghungalu, Wangerriburra, Wakka Wakka, Gubbi Gubbi, Kuku Yalanji, Bundjalung, Yuggera and ni-Vanuatu.

One of Australia’s most highly regarded artists and the 2014 winner of the prestigious Bulgari Art Prize, Daniel Boyd has been showing in Australia and internationally since 2005. He has participated in the 56th Venice Biennale (2015), as curated by Okwui Enwezor. Other major biennales and exhibitions include Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art: Divided Worlds, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide (2018); Mondialité, curated by Hans Ulrich Obrist & Asad Raza at the Boghossian Foundation, Villa Empain, Brussels, Belgium (2017); Defying Empire: National Indigenous Art Triennial, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra (2017); and The future is already here – it’s just not evenly distributed, 20th Biennale of Sydney, Australia (2016).  

Selected solo exhibitions include RAINBOW SERPENT (VERSION), a joint project with Gropius Bau, Berlin and IMA, Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane, Australia (2023); Daniel Boyd: Treasure Island, the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Australia (2022); Contemporary Art Projects #1, Chau Chak Wing Museum, University of Sydney, Australia (2020); Daniel Boyd, Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane, Australia (2016); Up In Smoke Tour, Natural History Museum, London, United Kingdom (2012); and The Transit of Venus - An exhibition with Daniel Boyd, Tin Sheds Gallery, University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia (2012).