Summer Collector's Show- New works, February 2021

Summer Collector’s Show 2021 New Works February 12-30

Summer Collector’s Show 2021 New Works February 12-30

Front: Michelle Lewis, Michelle’s Tjala Dreaming (honey ant dreaming), 2020, acrylic on canvas, 106 x 165cm (detail). Courtesy the artist and Ernabella Arts Left: Dhambit #2 Wanambi, Gudultja, 2019, ochre and micastudded black sand, 163 x 68cm.

Courtesy the artist and Buku Larrnggay Mulka

Text © Susan McCulloch Design © Lisa Reidy Images © The artists Published by Everywhen Artspace

Exhibiting Art Centres Artists of Ampilatwatja Buku Larrnggay Mulka Durrmu Arts Ernabella Arts Iwantja Arts MimiliMaku Papunya Tjupi Warlukurlangu Artists Warmun Art

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EXHIBITINGARTISTS Agnes Nampijinpa Brown Anita Pumani Anna Price Pitjara Annunciata Wilson Bernadine Kemarre Bettrina Pula Bundey Carlene Thompson Dhambit #2 Wanambi

Julie Yatjitja Kelvin Kemarre Ladd Maringka Burton Michelle Lewis Natalea Holmes Raylene Walatinna Samantha Hobson Sandra Pula Teece

Elizabeth Dunn

Steven Jupurrula Nelson

Emily Pwerle

Tjulyata Kulyuru

Gordon Barney

Watson Corby Tjungurrayi

Janet Golder Kngwarrye Jean Ngwarreye Long Jeannie Mills Pwerle Jill Kelly Kemarre

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introduction

More than 35 paintings, barks, ochres and sculptures from around Australia feature in the February showing of our Summer Collector’s Show 2021. Comprising a great diversity of styles and media, works include those by some of Aboriginal art’s most senior practitioners such as the East Kimberley’s Gordon Barney, Utopia’s Emily Pwerle and Jeannie Mills Pwerle and the APY Lands’ Maringka Burton. They are joined by a wide range of rising star and mid-career artists including Agnes Nampijinpa Brown and Steven Jupurrula Nelson from Warlukurlangu Artists of the Western Desert; Bernadine Kemarre and Janet Golder from Utopia; Anita Pumani from Mimili Maku in the APY Lands and Annunciata (Nunuk) Wilson from Durrmu Arts, Peppimenarti, NT. Special highlights are a group of works by talented new generation artists Elizabeth Dunn, Michelle Lewis and Tjulyata Kulyuru from Ernabella Arts, APY Lands; striking mica-studded black ochre barks and larrakitj (memorial poles) by Dhambit # 2 Wanambi from Buku Larrnggay Mulka, NE Arnhem Land and two important ochre paintings by Warmun artist Gordon Barney from the East Kimberley.

Susan McCulloch OAM February 2021

Left: Gordon Barney, Birnoo, 2014, ochre and charcoal on canvas, 150 x 150cm (detail). Courtesy the artist and Warmun Art

Agnes Nampijinpa Brown, Ngapa Jukurrpa (Water Dreaming) – Mikanji, 2020, acrylic on linen, 203 x 152cm MM5197 | $7900 The main painting theme of leading mid- career Warlpiri painter Agnes Nampijinpa Brown is Ngapa Jukurrpa (Water Dreaming) at several western desert sites. This painting documents events in the far west region of Mikanji where two important water dreaming sites converged. In one, a huge storm unleashed – witnessed by two ancestral sisters who were blind. As they strained their eyes to see the sky, tears formed in their eyes, creating rain.

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Anita Pumani, Antara – Maku Dreaming, 2019, acrylic on linen, 122 x 82cm | MM4566 | $1500 Anita Pumani, born 1982, is a highly talented emerging artist of the APY Lands who comes from a line of famous artists including her great- aunt Kunmanara (Milatjari) Pumani. She paints the Indigenous Protected Area of Antara near to the Mimili community and the story of the sacred Maku (Witchetty Grubs).

Anna Price Pitjara, Tali-Sand Hills, 2020, acrylic on linen, 122 x 91cm | MM5112 | $2900 Born in 1960, senior painter Anna Price Pitjara is an Anmatyerre woman from the Utopia region, north east of Alice Springs. She specialises in finely detailed dot work and has become well known for her lyrical representation of the tali (sandhills) of her country.

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Annunciata (Nunuk) Wilson, Wipun – Basket Stitch, 2017, acrylic on canvas, 199 x 112cm | MM5128 | $3900 Eldest daughter of the well-known artist Regina Pilawuk Wilson from Peppimenarti, NT, Annunciata (Nunuk) Wilson was born in 1969.

This striking painting represents the particular stitch used in basket weavings made by women of the region.

Bernadine Kemarre, Bush Medicine Leaves, 2021, acrylic on linen, 136 x 97cm | MM5187 | $2800 Born in 1974, Bernadine Kemarre brilliantly captures the leaves used for bush medicine by the women of the community of Utopia with great finesse and an ever evolving palette.

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Bettrina Pula Bundey, Bush Medicine Plants, 2020, acrylic on linen, 91 x 61cm | MM5170 | $1800 Born in 1983, Bettrina Pula Bundey is one of the talented new generation artists of Ampilatwatja in the NT. She paints the bush medicine plants used for healing on the body and for drinking and which are often collected by women of the region.

Carlene Thompson, Kalaya Ngura, 2020, acrylic on linen, 98 x 84 cm | MM5093 | $2200 Senior artist Carlene Thomson from Ernabella in the APY Lands the creation stories of her home region of Kanpi in the Western APY Lands. This is the country of the emu (kalaya) man – the ancestral being who formed that part of the country.

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Dhambit #2 Wanambi, ochres, mica- studded black sand on stringybark hollow logs L: Yalanba, 2017, 218cm x 18cm | MM5245 $5,200 R: Trial Bay, 2019, 231cm x 17cm | MM5247 | $5200 Born in 1970, N. E Arnhem Land artist Dhambit #2 Wanambi comes from a family of famous artists. Her larrakitj (memorial poles) are striking for her use of the mica-studded black sand unique to her Marrakulu people’s country of Yalanba. In these powerful works she relates the extensive and ancient creation stories of the lands and her people. Here the fresh waters of Gurk’awuy river (created by the ancestral sugarbag man who gouged its course by felling a stringybark tree while searching for honey) rush out to the sea to meet salt water, flowing around the sacred rocks. As the waters clash, the bubbles that burst upwards from the deep are equated with the universal life force.

Dhambit #2 Wanambi, ochres, mica-studded black sand on stringybark L to R: Guḏultja with sand from Yalanba, 2019, 159 x 64 cm | MM5248 | $3500 Gudultja, 2020, 163 x 68cm | MM 5249 $4500 Yalanba, 2020, 112 x 63cm | MM5251 $3800 Born in 1970, N. E Arnhem Land artist Dhambit #2 Wanambi comes from a family of famous artists. Her larrakitj (memorial poles) and barks are striking in her use of the mica-studded black sand unique to her Marrakulu people’s country of Yalanba. In these powerful works she relates the extensive and ancient creation stories of the lands and her people around the sacred, solitary rock in Trial Bay. Here the fresh waters of Gurk’awuy river (created by the ancestral sugarbag man who gouged its course by felling a stringybark tree while searching for honey) rush out to the sea to meet salt water, flowing around the sacred rocks. As the waters clash, the bubbles that burst upwards from the deep are equated with the universal life force.

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Elizabeth Dunn, Elizabeth Dunn’s Story, 2020, acrylic on linen, 120 x 150cm | MM5192 | $4200 Born at Ernabella, APY Lands in 1973, Elizabeth is a mid-career artist who paints the dreaming story of her great-grandfather’s country of Piltati in the Western APY Lands. Here, two Wanampi (Rainbow Serpent) ancestral figures, created a huge, deep, smooth-sided waterhole called Piltati. The Wanampi still live there today and provide rain for the bush tucker to grow and provide meat on the land.

Elizabeth Dunn, Elizabeth Dunn’s Story, 2020, acrylic on linen, 100 x 180cm | MM5191 | $4200 Born at Ernabella, APY Lands in 1973, Elizabeth is a mid-career artist who paints the dreaming story of her great-grandfather’s country of Piltati in the Western APY Lands. Here, two Wanampi (Rainbow Serpent) ancestral figures, created a huge, deep, smooth-sided waterhole called Piltati. The Wanampi still live there today and provide rain for the bush tucker to grow and provide meat on the land.

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Emily Pwerle, Awelye, 2020, acrylic on linen, 90 x 120cm | MM5175 | $3200 Now in her late 90s, Anmatyerre painter Emily Pwerle is one of the important family of Utopia artists that includes her late sister Minnie Pwerle, her niece Barbara Weir and great nieces Charmaine Pwerle and Teresa Purla. Her colourful paintings represent the designs women paint on their bodies for ceremonies.

Gordon Barney, Birnoo, 2014, ochre and charcoal on canvas, 150 x 150cm | MM5155 | $5900 An important law and cultural leader of the East Kimberley, Gordon Barney was born at Alice Downs Station (Birnoo) in 1945.

In his early years he was a stockman and rodeo rider. Now a leading painter, he depicts the mountain ranges and plants of his Birnoo country in textured ochres.

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Gordon Barney, Brolga taking the water away, 2006, ochre and charcoal on canvas, 140 x 100cm | MM5154 | $4900 An important law and cultural leader of the East Kimberley, Gordon Barney was born at Alice Downs Station (Birnoo) in 1945 and is now a leading ochre painter. In this significant early work, he relates the creation story of the ancestral brolga who, with a coolamon, removes all the water from a big waterhole as “he didn’t want the water there”.

Janet Golder Kngwarreye, My Country, 2020, acrylic on linen, 110 x 200cm | MM5218 | $4500 Born in 1973, Janet Golder Kngwarreye is the grand-daughter of two famous artists – Polly Ngale and Emily Kame Kngwarreye.

Here she celebrates her country through depicting a number of key women’s creation stories. These include bush melon, bush yam (of which she is a traditional custodian) and women’s ceremonies (Awelye) in which women paint their bodies and perform songs and dances to bring fertility to the lands.

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Janet Golder Kngwarreye, My Country, 2020, acrylic on linen, 120 x 90cm | MM5214 | $2700 Born in 1973, Janet Golder Kngwarreye is the grand-daughter of two famous artists – Polly Ngale and Emily Kame Kngwarreye.

Here she celebrates her country through depicting a number of key women’s creation stories. These include bush melon, bush yam (of which she is a traditional custodian) and women’s ceremonies (Awelye) in which women paint their bodies and perform songs and dances to bring fertility to the lands.

Jean Ngwarraye Long, Ntang Native Seeds, 2020, acrylic on linen, 91 x 91cm | MM5159 | $2400 Born in 1963, Jean Ngwarreye Long has lived in the eastern desert community of Ampilatwatja all her life. She was an artist in the original Utopia batik movement in the 1980s and started painting on canvas in the 1990s. Her subject is Ntang (native seeds).

The seeds are collected on a tarpaulin under a tree, ground with a grinding stone or mortar and pestle, mixed with water to damper-like consistency and placed under coals until cooked.

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Jeannie Mills Pwerle, Yam Dreaming, 2021, acrylic on linen, 223 x 112cm | MM5208 | $4900 An established and highly respected Alyawarre artist from the Utopia region, Jeannie Mills Pwerle’s aunt was the famous painter Emily Kame Kngwarreye. Jeannie is a traditional healer as well as artist. Using several colours on the same brushstroke, she skilfully represents the native yam which grows in her county – its root system and flowers in brushwork and its seeds in outlining dots. A much-collected food, the yam also has deep ceremonial significance to Alyawarre women.

Jeannie Mills Pwerle, Yam Dreaming, 2021, acrylic on linen, 196 x 122cm | MM5195 | $4900 An established and highly respected Alyawarre artist from the Utopia region, Jeannie Mills Pwerle is the niece of famous painter Emily Kame Kngwarreye. Jeannie is a traditional healer as well as artist. Using several colours on the same brushstroke, she skilfully represents the native yam which grows in her county – its root system and flowers in brushwork and its seeds in outlining dots.

A much-collected food, the yam also has deep ceremonial significance to Alyawarre women.

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Jeannie Mills Pwerle, Yam Dreaming, 2021, acrylic on linen L: 102 x 82cm | MM5210 | $2400 R: 117 x 92cm | MM5211 | $2400 An established and highly respected Alyawarre artist from the Utopia region, Jeannie Mills Pwerle is the niece of famous painter Emily Kame Kngwarreye. Jeannie is a traditional healer as well as artist. Using several colours on the same brushstroke, she skilfully represents the native yam which grows in her county – its root system and flowers in brushwork and its seeds in outlining dots.

A much-collected food, the yam also has deep ceremonial significance to Alyawarre women.

Julie Yatjitja, Iwantja Tjukitji (Iwantja Soakage), 2019, acrylic on linen, 122 x 152cm | MM4966 | $3200 Yankunytjatjara artist Julie Yatjitja was born in 1969 in the cool waters of the Iwantja creek next to the large soakage around which the community of Indulkana was founded in the 1960s. Shaded by large gum trees, the banks of the creek nestle close to large boulders. It is home to Tjurki (the native owl) that looks over the people. Julie’s paintings shimmer with an exuberant energy as she captures the intensity and power of her birthplace and its many rockholes, traveling lines and water sites .

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Kelvin Kemarre Ladd, Galahs, 2020, acrylic on canvas, 51 x 30cm | MM5171 | $490 Alywarre painter Kelvin Kemarre Ladd is one of the few male painters of Artists of Ampilatwatja approx. 230 k NE of Alice Springs.

He has become well known for his depictions of birds, animals and country and western performers. Here, he remembers his first pet galah as he depicts those at his home station of Epenarra.

Maringka Burton, Anamaruku Tjuta (Many Caterpillars), 2020, acrylic on linen, 122 x 152cm | MM5143 | $3200 Senior APY artist Maringka Burton is a traditional healer as well as painter. She paints her personal caterpillar-dreaming story relating to the country of her birth near the WA/SA border. She depicts the intricate twists and turns of the caterpillars as they burrow tunnels and holes into the earth leaving a patterned design of the lands on the desert sands. In her healing practice, she also uses caterpillar silk to bind cuts and help heal burns.

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Michelle Lewis, Michelle’s Tjala Dreaming (honey ant dreaming), 2020, acrylic on canvas, 106 x 165cm | MM5190 | $3900 A rising star artist of Ernabella Arts in the APY Lands, Michelle Lewis comes from a family of established artists including her mother Atipalku Intjalki. Michelle paints the tjala tjukurpa (honey ant dreaming) and landscape of her father’s country ‘from above, as you might see it from an airplane or as a bird looking down” – tracing the tracks of the ants in the sandy soil and depicting waterholes, trees and shrubs in country that is “quiet” (empty). One of the most famous and widespread of Aboriginal dreaming stories of all the desert regions, the Honey Ant which is also sought as a delicacy by Aboriginal people, is an important link between mythology and inter-dependence with the environment.

Michelle Lewis, Michelle’s Tjala Dreaming (honey ant dreaming), 2020, acrylic on canvas, 90 x 150cm | MM5189 | $3200 A rising star artist of Ernabella Arts in the APY Lands, Michelle Lewis comes from a family of established artists including her mother Atipalku Intjalki. Michelle paints the tjala tjukurpa (honey ant dreaming) and landscape of her father’s country “from above, as you might see it from an airplane or as a bird looking down” – tracing the tracks of the ants in the sandy soil and depicting waterholes, trees and shrubs in country that is “quiet” (empty). One of the most famous and widespread of Aboriginal dreaming stories of all the desert regions, the Honey Ant which is also sought as a delicacy by Aboriginal people, is an important link between mythology and inter-dependence with the environment.

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Natalea Pula Holmes, Country, 2019, acrylic on linen, 90 x 90cm | MM5173 | $1950 Natalea Pula Holmes b. 1985 is a talented Anmatyarre painter from the Utopia region. Holmes’s precise geometric abstract designs are based on the body designs that women paint on their bodies for ceremony. In recreating these, she is paying homage to both her country and the women who care for it. As here, her paintings often contain shimmer, the optical movement created by fine lines, which represents the spiritual power of the creation ancestors and is a highly prized quality in the field of Aboriginal art.

Raylene Walatinna, Ngayuku Ngura, 2020, acrylic on canvas, 91 x 122cm | MM5121 | $2400 Raylene Walatinna is a younger generation artist from the APY Lands of South Australia. Her work features tjukula or rockholes of her country. These collect pools of clean drinking water after heavy rain and are looked after and protected by Anangu (Aboriginal people of the area). Raylene’s distinctive paintings are gaining attention in leading galleries around Australia for their confident depiction of both the rockhole by concentric circles, and the surrounding country in map-like pathways and tracks.

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Samantha Hobson, Coral Sea Dreaming IIII, 2017, acrylic on canvas, 108 x 169cm | MM3971 | $6800 The most expressionistic of the founding group of FNQ’s Lockhart River painters that include Rosella Namok, Samantha Hobson’s paintings are both highly contemporary and strongly individual. Here, from an aerial perspective and painted in the shiny acrylic she favours, Hobson has captured the waves and luminosity of the tropical sea as it breaks over the coral reef.

Sandra Pula Teece, Bush Medicine Plants, 2020, acrylic on canvas, 61 x 61cm | MM5168 | $1200 Daughter of leading landscape painter Murphy Teece, talented younger-generation Alyawarre painter Sandra Pula Teece paints the plants used for bush medicine, gathered by the women of her community of Ampilatwatja in the NT.

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Steven Jupurrula Nelson, Janganpa Jukurrpa, 2020, 183 x 76cm | MM5086 | $3800 Steven Jupurrula Nelson is one of the most individual of Western Desert artists. Born in 1978 he has lived at Yuendumu, 290k north west of Alice Springs all his life. His main painting theme is Janganpa Jukurrpa (Brush Tail Possum Dreaming) and its nocturnal travels all over Warlpiri country in creation times. Nelson’s abstract expressionist style and striking colour combinations have led to his work becoming highly sought after.

Tjulyata Kulyuru, Tjukula Waterholes, 2020, acrylic on canvas, 90 x 150cm | MM5188 | $3800 Born in 1978 to a strong artistic family that includes her mother, the senior weaver and spinner Angkuna Kulyuru and sister, painter Unurupa Nami Kulyuru, Tjulyata Kulyuru, is an emerging artist from the APY Lands. Her finely-wrought, detailed depictions of the traveling lines radiating from and connecting the tjukula (waterholes) of her country have gained her work much attention since she started exhibiting in 2020.

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Watson Corby Tjungurrayi, Kalipinypa Tjukurrpa, 2020, acrylic and ochres on linen, 183 x 183cm | MM5132 | $7900 Born in 1973, Watson Corby Tjungurrayi is the son of founding Papunya Tula painter David Corby Tjapaltjarri and grandson of Johnny Warangkula Tjupurrula whose stories he has inherited the rights to paint. In this Rain Dreaming painting at the creation site of Kalipinypa made famous by his grandfather’s lyrical paintings, Corby has incorporated the ochre that is used in men’s ceremonies as a homage to both the ceremonies and his country, resulting in a unique painting of subtle power, depth and movement.

EVERYWHEN Artspace specialises in contemporary Australian Aboriginal art featuring paintings, barks, ochres, ceramics, sculptures and works on paper from 40 + Aboriginal art centres from around Australia.

Directors Susan McCulloch OAM and Emily McCulloch Childs.

EVERYWHEN Artspace 39 Cook Street, Flinders VIC 3929 T: +61 3 5989 0496 E: info@mccullochandmcculloch.com.au mccullochandmcculloch.com.au