About
Swathi Madike | Melbourne Portrait Artist

Her path to painting was not straightforward. Swathi holds a First Class Honours degree in Industrial Design from RMIT and built a career as a service designer before a single evening in Mumbai changed her direction entirely. Her housemate, an art curator at a gallery took her to a community art night, and something shifted internally as found something she was intrinsically drawn to. That spark led her to Italy in 2016 for a classical painting intensive at the Florence Academy of Art, and from there to scholarships and advanced training at the Julian Ashton Art School in Sydney and Studio Escalier in Argentonnay, France. The training she pursued was rigorous and deliberate, atelier-based classical realism, the discipline of learning to truly see.

Swathi's practice is shaped by a conviction that runs through everything she makes. She finds particular meaning in painting faces that have long been absent from classical portraiture’s historical canon.

Today Swathi serves as a Council Member and Education Convenor at the Victorian Artists Society in East Melbourne, and has worked as a workshop facilitator and panel member for the National Gallery of Victoria and the City of Casey. She has taught oil painting and portrait drawing at the Camberwell Community Centre, Box Hill Community Arts Centre, and the Victorian Artists Society, and offers private studio classes in Canterbury for teenagers and adults. She is a member of the Portrait Society of America and the Australian South Asian Centre.

Swathi accepts bespoke oil portrait commissions for private clients, families, corporate bodies, and institutions across Australia and internationally.