Lilach Mileikowski creates sculptural works that combine potency and delicacy through the multifaceted use of clay, glaze, fabric, wire, and printed scripts. Informed by her cultural background, her work evokes both personal and global significance. It reflects on the primal human need for connection, fortitude, and belonging.

Inspired by ancient vessels and artefacts, Lilach’s ceramics reveal a deep reverence for archetypal forms. The vessel, an object of sustenance, enabling us to carry food and water, also becomes a bearer of her family’s history of migration and cultural integration. Delicate parchments inscribed with sacred Hebrew prayers for protection wrap around surfaces, while excerpts from treasured family letters and recipes are pressed gently into crevices and voids.

As in nature, Lilach’s forms are repeated. She joins multiples to create one whole, where each component exists to balance the other, resulting in a work that is simultaneously precarious and resilient. A metaphor for the migrant experience.

Lilach’s practice is slow and layered, a continual dialogue with the form. Grounded in personal narrative, it speaks to shared experiences of migration, memory, and resilience. It reflects on how we hold our heritage, and how it, in turn, holds us.

Based in Melbourne and originally from Israel, Lilach brings a background in graphic design to her practice, holding a Bachelor of Design in Visual Communication. After migrating to Australia in 1995, completed a Diploma of Arts-Ceramics, and established her ceramics studio. This was followed by an Advanced Diploma of Creative Product Development. In 2016, she completed a Master of Fine Art at RMIT University, her research focusing on the spiritual and political concerns of identity, exploring the dual notions of fragility and strength.

Lilach’s work is held in private collections in Australia and internationally. She has been included in exhibitions such as the International Ceramics Festival, Mino, Japan; the Gold Coast International Ceramic Art Award, QLD; the Victorian Ceramic Art Award; the Muswellbrook Art Prize, NSW; the Woollahra Small Sculpture Prize, NSW; and the Lake Macquarie Art Prize, NSW. Her work has also been presented in SUSTENANCE, solo exhibition, Glen Eira Council Gallery, VIC; as a finalist in HELD by TACA; and in Fables & Folklore at Craft Victoria.

Recent highlights include Receiving the Yarra Valley Arts Sculpture Award (Yering Station, VIC) and the Rainford Family Award (North QLD Ceramic Awards) as well as being selected as a finalist in Continuum by TACA (Noosa, QLD, July-August 2026).

Invited on behalf of Craft Victoria and guest curator Tali Rothby, Lilach will be exhibiting in the Craft Victoria end-of-year show, Visionaries. November 2026 – February 2027.