Art connects to Country

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Tags: Indigenous, summer-2011, UQ Art Museum

Mitjili Napurrula’s Uwalki – Watiya Tjuta from the Painting Country exhibition

UQ’s evolving collection of Indigenous art was on show to the public to coincide with NAIDOC Week 2011.

Painting Country explored an array of approaches and styles characteristic of Indigenous art and featured several new acquisitions donated to the University.

“Representation of Indigenous artists in the collection was boosted in 2010 by several gifts, including artworks donated by Christopher Thomas and Mark Alexander, and Patrick Corrigan AM,” UQ Art Museum Director Dr Campbell Gray said.

“The paintings reveal the artists’ enduring relationship with their homeland, and ongoing engagement with their culture and Country through art.”

Works by Donald Moko, Margaret Baragurra and Rusty Peters from Western Australia were shown alongside paintings by Desert artists Kathleen Petyarre, Lorna Napanangka and Elizabeth Marks Nakamarra. Queensland artist Dennis Nona from the Torres Strait was also represented.

“Regional differences are determined in part by the stories and iconographies specific to each place, passed down through generations,” associate curator Samantha Littley said.

“While these qualities may help distinguish the paintings of artists from particular regions, diversity exists within these conventions, with artists bringing their own experiences and individual aesthetic to their work.”

Ms Littley said several of the artists had moved away from their place of birth either by choice or as the result of intervention.

“In every instance, the artists included in Painting Country create work that connects to their Country, and keeps their culture strong,” she said.

By Samantha Littley

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