Nikala Bourke is an emerging Tasmanian artist based in Hobart. Working primarily in photography and the visual arts, she completed a Bachelor of Fine Arts with Honours in 2017 at the College of the Arts, University of Tasmania. Nikala is a Registered Nurse and has tutored Photography to first year art students at the School of Creative Arts, Hobart. She is represented by Penny Contemporary Gallery in Hobart.

Nikala utilises light, magnification, glass and water within both analogue (alternative) and digital photographic processes to fuel her curiosity and experimentation in a visual sense. Celebrating the mystery of water and replicating the water’s edge and the beach landscape is a common thread in her practice, as is the observation of natural materials, predominantly local flowers, plants and seaweeds. She engages with the natural environment as a way of calming her body and mind and is interested in how artworks can positively trigger those similar somatic or emotional memories and associations.