Mel Douglas was born and raised in Tasmania. She has worked as an independent studio artist since graduating from the Canberra School of Art, Australian National University in 2000, where she has also been a lecturer. In 2020, she received her PhD based on research she carried out at the ANU’s Glass Workshop and at Bullseye in Portland, OR. In addition to winning the 2020 Tom Malone Prize, a prestigious award through which a work is acquired each year into the collection of the National Gallery of Western Australia, Douglas has received several major awards including the Ranamok Glass Prize in 2002, the International Young Glass Award in 2007 from the Ebeltolft Museum of Glass.

Douglas’ work is held in the private collections and public institutions internationally, including the Corning Museum of Glass, New York; the Cincinnati Art Museum, Ohio; the Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, VA (presented for acquisition by Diane Wright and winner of the Masterpiece art selection event); the Ebeltoft Museum of Glass, Denmark, the Powerhouse Museum, Sydney, Australia; and National Gallery of Australia, Australia. In 2019 her work was the inaugural acquisition for the NGA’s Robert and Eugenie Bell Decorative Arts and Design Fund.

(excerpts from hellergallery.com and meldouglasglass.com, accessed 5.2.2023)