Julia Vanderbyl is an artist, filmmaker and writer whose work celebrates the natural world while advocating for its protection. In 2020, she co-founded the environmental platform Mother the Mountain, quickly amassing a devoted fan base of over 2 million followers. Through film, art, writing, and photography, she documents her journey of restoring the rainforest, caring for animals and living with the earth — inspiring her audience to recognise and protect the wonder of nature.
vanderbyljulia@gmail.com
Julia’s lush, captivating paintings are autobiographical tributes to nature, highlighting the fragile beauty of the natural world alongside her own existence. Born from a deep communion with her surroundings, Julia’s visions of nature dance between landscape and portraiture, standing as a testament to the interconnectedness of humans and their environment.
In 2023 she released her first book “Mother The Mountain: The Art of Living with Nature” published by Dorling Kindersley / Penguin Random House.
Her work has been exhibited within Australia and internationally with her fist solo exhibition “Eternally Present in Absence” showing in Paris in 2019 followed by her 2020 Melbourne solo exhibition “Of the Anthropocene”. In 2023 she showed her most recent body of work at The Fitzrovia Gallery, London in an immersive exhibition that explored environmentalism, her experiences of surviving climate disasters and the extraordinary resilience of nature.
Julia lives and works on the land of the Arakwal and Minjungbal People of the Bundjalung Nation. She acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of the Country she lives on and recognises their continuing connection to the land and waters. She thanks them for protecting this rainforest and its ecosystems since time immemorial.