However, life didn’t unfold exactly the way Abraham had planned, and while she remains passionate about politics, she has discovered that expressing her political views and interests through art is more her style.

Now 37, Abraham has been making art for many years – first as a potter and more recently as a painter – but her career has really taken off in the past two years since the talented artist turned to painting full-time.

Not only was Abraham named as a winner of the $20,000 Henry Jones Art Prize in November, but she’s also heading to Paris – from October 1 to December 31 this year – after being awarded a residency at the Cité International des Arts, by the Art Gallery of NSW.

Her work recently graced the pages of fashion bible Vogue Australia, with Abraham thrust into the spotlight as a “dynamic” creative “setting the cultural tone” for 2025 – while being listed as one of the “names you need to know in Australian art this year” – a pinch-me moment Abraham describes as “crazy”.

Add to that a string of exhibitions coming up later this year – including an exhibition in Singapore in June (her first time showing work outside of Australia), followed by an exhibition at Sydney Contemporary, in September, and a joint exhibition at the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, in November – and Abraham, who is represented interstate by leading contemporary gallery Sullivan + Strumpf, has got a serious list of artistic deadlines locked in for 2025.

She’s also anticipating a major exhibition in 2026 which will come out of her time in Paris, where the Lebanese Australian will undertake a research project at the Institut du Monde Arabe (IMA) – also known as the World Arab Institute – to inform the development of her painting practice.

Abraham is enjoying her artistic success, even though she didn’t follow a traditional path to become an artist.

She considered moving to Canberra after she finished her degree in politics – some of her uni mates went on to have successful diplomatic careers in the nation’s capital – but for some reason she felt she “couldn’t quite make the move” interstate at that time, and instead started making ceramics in Tassie while also teaching herself to draw.

Abraham did eventually move interstate – spending five years living, working and studying in Melbourne – but is now enjoying being back in her home state of Tasmania, living “back on the hill where I grew up” at Molesworth.

She paints from a studio in the back room of the home – the same rural property where she spent much of her childhood – and finds great inspiration in the Derwent Valley landscape.

Abraham describes her large-scale oil paintings as having a “chaos optimism vibe” – she investigates inner workings of self as she “infuses subversive qualities with traditional painting techniques to execute dynamic compositions focused on the body and the landscape”.

She says there is an almost “fairytale” element to her paintings, along with “a feminine energy”, an injection of history and politics and a bit of a mysterious twist to keep viewers guessing. “A lot of it is how I feel about being somewhere,’’ Abraham explains.

“I keep painting scenes that are very much based in landscape, very bucolic, but I think they’re infused with how I feel in those same landscapes.

“I tell stories about my sister and I, or I tell stories about thinking through time, or use historical poses I’ve seen – I love art history so I love to think about what I would have done if I was (alive and painting) back then, and then I look outside and it’s 2025 so I think about what’s going on in the world today.

“I think people see my work as being based in traditional painting – I’m painting in oil – but at the same time there’s a confusing or unlikely element to it that feels contemporary. It’s all very romantic, and a little bit disturbing. I like to think of it as a sort of chaos optimism vibe.’’

She says just as individuals interpret songs in different ways, she expects individual viewers will interpret her work in different ways.

“I think I try and leave some unknowns in each work,’’ Abraham explains.

“So you can put yourself in it – there’s room for people to get whatever they want out of it.’’

She enjoyed the process of working out what sort of painter she would become, and still enjoys discovering what sort of images will emerge from her mind and make it on to the canvas in front of her.

“I like that idea of: ‘What would we all paint, if everyone ended up painting?’,” Abraham says.

Having initially started working in ceramics – she ran previously ran Art Hole gallery at New Town for several years before moving to Melbourne to complete a Diploma of Visual Arts, Advanced Diploma of Visual Arts and a Bachelor of Fine Arts, all at RMIT university – Abraham says she enjoys the added storytelling element that painting affords her.

“I love ceramics, it’s such a hands-on art form, it’s a very satisfying medium to work in,’’ she says.

“But I felt painting could be way more narrative driven, with more storytelling. I felt like I could communicate something completely different through painting.

“I paint because it is a beautiful and intriguing way to tell stories, start fights, make jokes, gush beauty and question the way the world works.’’

And both mediums offer an element of surprise that Abraham enjoys.

“When you make ceramics and you open the kiln, you never quite know what you’re going to get,’’ she explains, adding that textures, glazes and colours can vary wildly in the firing process.

“Painting to me is a little bit like that. I sort of map out an idea and I use my hands to paint, as well as brushes – I want to create a surprise for myself. Painting can be very depressing if it’s not going well, and it can be an insane high when it is going well. I paint using what I know about tone and colour and form and all of a sudden I have this work, and it’s crazy.’’

Being surrounded by nature is also an important part of Abraham’s creative process.

She says her 12ha property – which is “quite steep and bushy” and is “300m above sea level” – is the perfect place to retreat from the outside world and concentrate on painting.

“It’s got a hermitage nature to it,’’ she says of the property, which has minimal visitors.

“There’s lots of concentrated time to get work done. It’s quite idyllic really; I feel quite lucky.’’

She typically begins to “sketch in” her paintings with some brightly-coloured acrylics, creating somewhere between two and six paintings at once.

“I put them all around me to get a feel for what is happening – it’s quite rare that I would ever work on one painting at a time,’’ Abraham says.

“I like working in series – I usually work on one to two at a time, and rotate until all six are done.’’

She rises early and makes a coffee before heading into the studio, where she works solidly – with only a break for lunch – before putting her tools down at about 5pm or 6pm when her husband gets home.

“After dinner, once I’ve had a break, I’ll wander out and have a look,’’ Abraham explains.

“Out there at night time, it’s a whole different vibe and I’ve got distance from it.’’

Sometimes her sister Maggie, who lives on the same property, will drop by to offer her own unique perspective on the works.

“I often get my sister to come up – and she is brutal,’’ Abraham laughs of her sibling, who is four years her junior and features in some of her paintings.

“She’ll say ‘that hand looks stupid’ or ‘that’s distractingly bad’ or ‘that’s good’.’’

They’ve even set up a board with two buzzers – so Maggie can buzz “yes” or “no” depending on whether she feels each of her sister’s paintings are finished.

Family is clearly important to Abraham, who actually moved back to Tasmania from interstate three years ago to care for her father, who was unwell.

Her dad was born in Lebanon and immigrated to Australia with his family as a child, initially settling in Marrickville in NSW, where there was a large Lebanese community, before moving to Tasmania in the 1970s with his brother, to start a leadlight restoration business.

It was a bold move back then – Abraham says there were very few people in Tasmania with Arab backgrounds, and with their “massive beards and curly hair” the men would certainly have stood out. But they loved Tasmania and Abraham’s grandparents later followed their sons and also moved to Tassie.

Abraham was born in Tasmania and attended Molesworth Primary School, before the family moved to Launceston where she attended Trevallyn Primary School and Riverside High School.

She got a scholarship to attend The Friends’ School for years 11 and 12, which brought the family back to Hobart, and Abraham then completed a Bachelor of Arts, majoring in politics, at the University of Tasmania.

Abraham says her Lebanese heritage inspired her to apply for the art residency in Paris.

“I’m half Lebanese and I’m very interested in connecting back with that,’’ she explains.

“My dad died two years ago and I think missing him, in a way, really pushed my sister and I on to find those connections. It’s a really nice way to strengthen up memories of things, of culture and language.’’

The Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris is a not-for-profit art centre which provides studio accommodation for artists and scholars from around the world. The Art Gallery of NSW offers a three-month tenancy in the Moya Dyring Studio or Dr Denise Hickey Memorial Studio to Australian visual artists and researchers in the visual arts, and Abraham was announced earlier this year as the artist chosen for a 2025 residency. It’s an unfunded residency, so Abraham says her Henry Jones Art Prize win was perfectly timed as it will help fund the trip.

“I feel an exciting rush to my head thinking about the people, history, art and language that I am going to encounter at the Cité in Paris later this year,’’ Abraham said when she was announced as the successful recipient of the residency.

“There is a huge collection of Lebanese contemporary art held at the IMA that is virtually impossible to see in the flesh without travelling there. Bringing that knowledge and experience back home is really special. Thank you AGNSW for this opportunity to make art that I cannot even imagine yet.’’

She says Lebanon has been through a never ending series of tests – from civil war that raged from 1975 to 1990, to the Beirut port explosion, in 2020, which killed 218 people, wounded 7000 more and decimated parts of the city, displacing more than 300,000 people. And everything its citizens have been through, has led to “some really unique insights” from artists.

“I’m so proud to be half Lebanese,’’ says Abraham, who is inspired by the resilience of Lebanese people, despite the many challenges they face.

She visited Lebanon a couple of years ago, visiting her family village in the country’s north, and hopes to return in the future, when there is less political unrest.

She expects what she learns during her residency, combined with memories from her time in Lebanon, will form the basis for a new exhibition in 2026.

“As an Arab Australian – and with everything happening in Lebanon and Palestine and the Middle East – it’s just about trying to reconcile everything and be making art,’’ she says.

“I love working in an activist space and an art space. It helps me articulate myself in both spaces.’’

Abraham says art and politics have always been closely intertwined throughout history, so her political degree – although not initially intended to form part of an art career – has proven useful in her new-found occupation as a painter. In fact, she can recall referencing paintings in her political essays, as she was always fascinated by the way historical moments were depicted through art.

“Politics and art – I’ve always been very interested in how they relate to each other,’’ she says.

Abraham didn’t really start painting until she was 29, and even then, she only started painting full-time two years ago.

Like most emerging artists, she has worked in a string of odd jobs over the years to make ends meet – she has worked in hospitality, at a bottle shop, as a tutor, and as a hospital theatre technician, among other roles.

“I really enjoyed some other jobs I did,’’ Abraham admits.

“But now it’s amazing to work full-time painting, it’s a whole different thing. I started representation with Sullivan + Strumpf and it has been amazing, everything has finally come together. I’m still full of self doubt, but love it.’’

She says her family property at Molesworth, which is home to olive trees planted by her grandfather about 40 years ago, is like “Little Lebanon” in summer, while also being surrounded by “beautiful Tasmanian bush”.

She never imagined she’d be back living on the property she grew up on, as an adult, but losing her dad had taken her on a path she wasn’t expecting.

“You just feel this full-circleness of life,’’ Abraham says.

“It makes you an adult, in a way, even if you weren’t ready to be an adult. Losing a parent has just changed my whole outlook on life in so many ways. It’s very poignant.’’

And she still can’t quite believe the girl who grew up as the “stubborn, sensible older sister” who was passionate about politics ended up working full-time as a painter.

“I have no regrets now, but I couldn’t have predicted this path,” she says.•

For updates on Marion Abraham’s work and her upcoming exhibitions visit marionabraham.com or follow @minminmarion on Instagram