Melina Payne is a Goomurrup-born curator and arts manager currently based in Naarm.

Her career has centred on supporting early-career contemporary artists through leadership roles such as Co-Chair and Managing Director at MEANWHILE, Executive Director at Inverlochy Art School, and Curator at Homestead Galleries at Corban Estate Arts Centre. She currently serves on the board of Australian Walking Artists (AWA).

Deeply engaged in community-driven and post-representational curatorial practice, Melina co-produces conceptually rich exhibitions that position art as a space for experimentation, critique, communication, playfulness, and hope. Her practice is grounded in the belief that galleries can function as public platforms for transversal learning — fostering collective futures and celebrating diverse ways of living together. She works to balance urgency with thoughtful care, inviting audiences into spaces of reflection and dialogue.

Melina’s approach is rooted in collaboration with artists, scholars, activists, and community groups to explore the social and cultural dimensions of art. Committed to expanding alternative knowledge systems and interdisciplinary thinking, she foregrounds overlooked histories and aims to inspire engagement with art’s power to reflect, interpret, and reimagine the world.

Her curatorial practice is also deeply informed by hospitality — a value shaped by her upbringing in a household where food and gathering were central. With chefs in the family, she learnt that coming together is about more than nourishment — it is about fostering spaces of connection, welcome, and engagement. This ethos carries through to her curating, where care, participation, and inclusivity are central.

Similarly, walking plays a significant role in Melina’s thinking — not only as a metaphor but as a practical curatorial method. She is drawn to artists who use walking to map histories, question structures of power, and examine the relationship between self and environment.