Chantelle Stewart is a contemporary artist whose work is shaped by her connection to the environment.

Living and working on Sydney’s Northern Beaches, Chantelle first gained recognition for her figurative works exploring childhood nostalgia, a direction that led to winning the 2024 The Next Big Thing Art Prize.

Her practice has since returned to its roots in abstraction, where she continues to explore the interplay between material, colour, and landscape. Her work is a dialogue with nature: marks made, resisted, absorbed, or redirected. Foraged grasses, leaves, sticks, and charcoal, along with water and cloth, shape her process. What results is less paintings of the earth than paintings with it, an act of letting go and being open to guidance.

Alongside her studio practice, Chantelle runs workshops that encourage others to explore abstraction in a way that is open, playful, and rooted in experimentation. Her work has been recognised through awards and prizes, most recently as a finalist in the 2025 Paddington Art Prize.