Dr Daniela Vavrova – Creative Visual Anthropologist
Dr Daniela Vavrova is an Adjunct Research Fellow at James Cook University (JCU), where she works as a casual academic and researcher. She founded The AV Lab and was a founding member of the Anthropological Laboratory for Tropical Audiovisual Research (ALTAR) at The Cairns Institute and the College of Arts, Society and Education (JCU). Daniela has also worked as a casual researcher at Central Queensland University (CQU), and was Museum Curator at the Cairns Museum between 2022 and 2024.
Her work explores the intersection of anthropology and visual communication — examining how written accounts, photography, and filmmaking convey human experience. Since 2005, she has conducted fieldwork in Papua New Guinea, focusing on how people shape and are shaped by their social and cultural environments through sensory experience. Daniela is an accomplished photographer and a skilled communicator.
In recent years, she has expanded her professional focus to cybersecurity — particularly in governance, risk, and strategy. She is also a licensed Private Investigator and currently acts as the Far North Queensland Regional Manager with Complete Corporate Services.
Download my CV
Current Project: Yorkeys Knob Living History Project 2024- 2026
Yorkeys Knob Living History Project is a celebration of the coastal village named after a sea cucumber merchant. The Living History represents the strength and resilience of this coastal community through a collection of testimonies by its long-term residents. It is a portrayal of the past, present, and future. The project is sponsored by the Regional Arts Development Fund, Yorkeys Knob Residents Association, Yorkeys Knob Boating Club, and many volunteers.
The Regional Arts Development Fund is a partnership between the Queensland Government and Cairns Regional Council to support local arts and culture in regional Queensland.
The most recent Multimedia Exhibition I is Another at NorthSite, Cairns, Far North Queensland, Australia and Welcoming Cairns in Tanks, Cairns Botanical Gardens, showcased my latest digital collages under the title Following the South, Sun, and Sea. On the Intersection of Art and Academia
Anthropological Laboratory for Tropical Audiovisual Research (ALTAR)
Online Tutor – SUPERPROF
Most current study accomplishment:
Cybersecurity Risk and Strategy
Selected Articles available online:
2024, Archives as Artefacts of Knowledge: A Sepik Philosopher and a Chinese Trader in Papua New Guinea. Written together with Rosita Henry and Laurie Bragge. Chapter 2 in The Chinese in Papua New Guinea, Past Present and Future. ANU Press, Australian National University. Edited by Hayes, Henry, Wood.
2023, The Orator’s Chair – a chair not to be sat upon! Cairns Museum exhibition content for 50 Treasures Revisited.
2023, Smell Pods, Cairns Museum exhibition content for Growing up in the Tropics.
2022, Graun Em Pulap Long Pipia: Rubbish, Sorcery, and Spiritual Healing, Papua New Guinea. eTropic, Special Issue: Tropical Materialisms: poetics, practices, possibilities, 21(2), 65-76. doi: 10.25120/etropic.21.2.2022
2021, Bodily Connections Between Yielding and Knowing in Anthropological Filmmaking and Internal Martial Arts. Anthrovision 9.1. doi: 10.4000/anthrovision.8547
2020, Brideprice and Prejudice: An Audio-Visual Ethnography on Marriage and Modernity in Mt Hagen, Papua New Guinea. Rosita Henry and Daniela Vávrová. Oceania 90(3), 214-233. doi: 10.1002/ocea.5254
2020, Kiap Period Photo Albums, by Laurie Bragge (1961-1967). Catalogue 50 Treasures. Celebrating 50 Years of James Cook University, pp. 70-71. AND PHOTO BLOG
2018, The Rocking of Canoe and Custom: Shifts in Ambonwari’s Perception of Invisible Realm, Secrecy and Village Hierarchy, in Le Journal de la Société des Océanistes 146 (a special issue ‘The materiality of Sepik societies New visions, old problems’, edited by Philippe Peltier, Markus Schindlbeck and Christian Kaufmann), pp. 55-62.
2016, ‘An Extraordinary Wedding’, Some Reflections on the Ethics and Aesthetics of Authorial Strategies in Ethnographic Filmmaking. Prof Rosita Henry and Daniela Vávrová. AnthroVision 4(1), 1-20. doi: 10.4000/anthrovision.2237
2014, Cinema in the Bush. Journal of Visual Anthropology (27)1-2, pp. 25-44. doi: 10.1080/08949468.2014.852058
2014, Ringing the Living and the Dead: Mobile Phones in a Sepik Society. Borut Telban and Daniela Vávrová. The Australian Journal of Anthropology (25)2, pp. 223-238.
2009, Schools & the Language of Birds. The weekly magazine .tyždeň 30/2009, 27 July, pp. 52-54. In Slovakian language
Documentary Film AWARDS:
2009 Wiley-Blackwell Student Film Prize Commendation at the 11th RAI (Royal Anthropological Institute) International Festival of Ethnographic Film, Leeds, UK, 1-4 July for Enet Yapai. An Ambonwari Girl (2008, 25 minutes), English subtitles, HDV format, East Sepik Province, Papua New Guinea. A part of Mag. Phil. thesis. Filmed, edited and directed by Daniela Vavrova, produced by the Institute of Anthropological and Spatial Studies, Scientific Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Ljubljana, Slovenia. Distributed by The Royal Anthropological Institute > www.therai.org.uk
2016 Student Film Prize at the 13th GIEFF (Göttingen International Ethnographic Film Festival) in Germany, 4 – 8 May for ‘Skin has Eyes and Ears’ Audio-visual Ethnography in a Sepik Society, Papua New Guinea (2014, 83:22 minutes), English subtitles, HDV format, East Sepik Province, Papua New Guinea. Filmed, edited and produced by Daniela Vavrova. This film is an audio-visual part of my written PhD thesis bearing the same title.
Visual Anthropology - Production & Research 