Artists

Ju Bavyka is a writer and visual artist, born in Petropavlovsk, Kazakhstan, living on Wangal and Gadigal Land.

Working across text, installation and drawing, they write, publish, collaborate, and exhibit from a queer migrant perspective. With a background in architecture and visual communication, Ju often uses vernacular materials and performative formats in their work. Ju’s essays, poetry, and creative non-fiction — exploring migration, queerness, labour, and structural exclusion — have appeared in un Magazine, Runway Conversations, Liminal, InterAlia, and others. Ju is the 2025 recipient of the Peter Blazey Fellowship and is currently working on their first book, Just a Hand’s Reach Away – Rukoi Podat’.

In Residence at Bundanon

Ju’s book project Just a Hand’s Reach Away – Rukoi Podat’ is an autobiographical exploration of intergenerational relationships, queer existence, and the migrant experience. Set across Kazakhstan, Germany, and Australia, it connects personal memory with cultural observation to ask how identities shaped by dislocation survive and where they belong. Ju focuses on the transformation of early and mid-90s post-socialist Eastern Europe and Central Asia, exploring how the concept of “queerness” arrived there from the West— framing queer identities as Western imports and human rights discourses as external impositions.