Every year, the Capital Arts Patrons’ Organisation (CAPO) distributes funds to local artists through their Annual Grants Round, where the best and brightest amongst Canberra’s arts community are given opportunity to further their practice.

2021 CAPO Fellow, Canberra composer and musician, Michael Sollis, told Canberra Daily the award will allow him to develop an astrologically inspired body of work and continue his work advocating for individual artists.

The 36-year-old was diagnosed with bowel cancer in May, shortly before his wife Kiri gave birth to their second child.

“I had surgery, had chemo, and the following day, we welcomed our second son into the world,” he said. “I still had a bag connected to me with the drugs pumping in.”

A few months later when the ACT plunged into lockdown, Sollis and his family were presented with a host of new challenges.

“It was hard,” he said. “I’m on chemo every two weeks and looking after the family is tricky, but we’re blessed to be living on such beautiful country and having such wonderful support.”

“All we can do is just take one step at a time on that cancer journey and so that’s what we’re doing; every week is a little different.”

Taking to the Southern Sky

Since the diagnosis, Sollis has focused his creative energy on a long-term artistic project called Southern Sky.

It commenced a decade ago in dramatic fashion when Sollis premiered musical works written by an Estonian composer after visiting Australia in the burnt-out ruins of the Mount Stromlo Observatory.

Since then, he wrote a companion piece with astronomer Fred Watson in the arctic, and created an exhibition with Aranda songwriter, Warren Williams, in Tennant Creek.

The funds associated with being named CAPO Fellow will allow Sollis to add another work to the project.

“CAPO has been a wonderful organisation and is led by artists and people who work in the arts,” he said. “It’s a real honour to be selected as the fellow.”

He will enlist around 20 artists, both locally and abroad across numerous mediums, to create visual and digital works that respond to Southern Sky.

Pandemic a ‘mixed bag for artists’

Sollis is also eager to use the platform of CAPO Fellow to further advocate for the needs of individual artists, a cause he’s extremely passionate about.

He said the pandemic has been “a very mixed bag for artists” where inequities and deficiencies within the sector were laid bare.

“Over many decades, a disconnect has developed between arts organisations and individual artists, not out of any bad will, it’s just how the sector has evolved,” he said.

“This was really noted when the pandemic happened, a lot of artists weren’t supported and there were horror stories of the way artists weren’t supported from organisations.”

Sollis believes great progress can be made by allowing individual artists to be involved with the governance of arts organisations.

“No one knows the individual needs of artists like practicing artists,” he said. “If we can bring these parties together, it’s going to benefit everyone.”

A born-and-bred Canberran, Sollis firmly believes his hometown is the place where strides can be made.

“The goodwill is all there, it’s just a few things in the structures of how arts ecology work could just shift a little bit to improve things for artists.”

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