Exhibitions

Australian aboriginal art is the oldest living art tradition in the world, and one that is seeped in spiritual knowledge and truth. Most aboriginal art relates to stories of the Dreamtime. The Dreamtime is the creation period in aboriginal belief when ancestral beings formed the land and created the people, the plants and the animals. Paddy Japaljarri Stewart, one of the featured artists in this exhibition painted his “Snake Dreaming” so that aboriginal children would remember their ancestry.

Paddy’s artistic career commenced in the early 1980’s and has only gained momentum and significance through the years, with over 100 group shows including this cultural heavyweight’s work. This amazing man is a force to be reckoned with and has accomplished so much in his lifetime – from a school bus driver, to a remarkable artist who has travelled to Paris with five others creating a ground painting installation at the exhibition ‘Magiciens de la Terre’ at the Centre Georges Pompidou.

ReDot Fine Art Gallery is the first and only dedicated aboriginal art Gallery in Singapore, and indeed, the only one throughout Asia-Pacific. It has been in operation since 2004, and is located in the heart of Singapore’s dock precinct. ReDot features a superb range of aboriginal art at both affordable prices for art lovers as well as more important collectors’ pieces for investment purposes. The gallery represents artists from areas across the northern and western deserts of Australia - where the majority of the aboriginal Art Centres are located, as well as Queensland and the top end of Northern Australia.

Please email info@redotgallery.com or call 62221039 for more information.

ReDot Fine Art Gallery is honoured to host Lindsay HARRIS’s first ever international and solo show titled ‘Koort Boodja’ (Heart Land); a fitting recognition for a man that has been recently selected as one of the top 20 indigenous artists in Australia for the upcoming exhibition ’unDisclosed’: 2nd National Indigenous Art Triennial’ to be held at the National Gallery of Australia just ahead of the opening of this show.

Lindsay Harris is a contemporary Indigenous Australian artist who lives and works in Lesmurdie, situated in the Perth Hills, on the south coast of Western Australia. He is from the Nyoongar people, who have lived in parts of Western Australia for at least 45,000 years. The Nyoongar lived in balance with the natural environment; the main source of food and water came from the sea, and the extensive system of freshwater lakes in the area.

Lindsay Harris states: “I am a Nyoongar artist and my interest has always been finding ways of representing my lands (Kwolyin). I see through my eyes which invoke memories of Kwolyin in the central wheat belt of Western Australia and of the surrounding districts where I once lived. As a Noongar I have and I share in a special relationship to the country of my forebears. Overarching this relationship is the respect for my country and my involvement in its care and representation.

When making my art, I introduce both memories and images of granite rocks, tracks and salt lakes. The bold brush strokes in my paintings hide an underlying current of past tensions experienced by my people and their lands. I paint using resin which gives me a feeling of marking and being connected to the land. I like to compare the markings I make to the tracks and paths that have criss-crossed my land since ancient times. I feel that my art has to give a sense of intimacy and connection to my boodja (Land).I paint using sticks which gives me a feeling of scarring the land. I like to compare the markings I make to the ceremonial scarring of the body, still practised by Aboriginal people today.”

Since his first exhibition in 2006, Lindsay Harris has developed through his art, and under the guidance of emerge art space, his technical skills as a painter and his works almost seem sculptural! Combined with his deep passion for his country, the viewer feels they see an object, which allows them an intimate insight to boodja, his land.

His simple yet powerful compositions are the result of his unique placement of shapes and motifs, combined with a rich, organic palette of colour. His application of a variety of pigments, ochre and resins creates the effect of earthy texture, which he feels connects him with the land. Lindsay’s intensely personal affiliation with his country is powerfully conveyed through his paintings, and creates a universal dialogue that draws the viewer into his world.

Lindsay adds ‘At the heart of it, a meeting place where Noongars always gathered. The idea of being koort is the heart place. Health, happiness, family, good times when coming together. My paintings come from physical and spiritual nourishment created from having an intimacy when in my country. This is possibly why an explanation to the viewer is necessary about my art as it is difficult to fully appreciate the meaning if one has not been there and breathed and rested in these lands as I have. ’

Lindsay’s work has received public and critical acclaim and he was a finalist in the 25th National Aboriginal & Torres Straits Islander Art Award in 2008, culminating in his selection for ‘unDisclosed’ opening in Canberra in May 2012. His work is also held in numerous private collections in Australia and internationally as well as the National Gallery of Victoria and the Art Gallery of Western Australia.

The exhibition opens on Wednesday April 4th and runs till Saturday May 19th 2012, opening reception on Wednesday April 11th. ReDot Fine Art Gallery invites anyone fascinated by indigenous art and culture to step into a world that is familiar in its simplicity but mesmorizing in its depth and wonder. The living stories virtually leap off each canvas.

ReDot Fine Art Gallery is honoured to host Paddy JAPALJARRI STEWART’s first ever Solo Exhibition, titled ‘Panu’ (All); a fitting climax to a career of a man whose knowledge of the desert and its mystical laws is ALL encompassing. This amazing man is a force to be reckoned with and has accomplished so much in his lifetime – from a school bus driver, to a remarkable artist.

We at ReDot Fine Art Gallery are fortunate enough to have the only exhibit of replicas of the Yuendumu door school project along with the artist proof version of the works on paper. Paddy has painted this entire series, recounting and re-telling each of the dreamings depicted on those iconic doors so many years ago.

In the early 1970s the people of Yuendumu began transferring their traditional stories, dreamings (tjukurrpa) and ground paintings to western mediums such as canvas boards and plywood; then to the doors of the Yuendumu school. In 1984 five aboriginal artists, including Paddy, painted thirty iconic doors at the Yuendumu school. These thirty doors represented the dreaming of the Warlpiri people, an extraordinary history of sacred rituals, painted to remind the children of their patrimony – the web of sites and obligations that extend across Warlpiri country.

Paddy, who is the only surviving artist of the original five, was widely acknowledged as being the force behind the school project given his close ties to the school and his role of teaching young children both kardiya and yapa (non-aboriginal and aboriginal). He is a gentle, intelligent man, incredibly knowledgeable about the country and the laws associated with it and he has had an extraordinary life as an artist. His artistic career commenced in the early 1980’s and has only gained momentum and significance through the years, over 100 group shows have included this cultural heavyweight’s work and it remains a mystery why it has taken until 2012 to witness the first ever solo exhibition of his works at the tender age of 76 or so.

The combination of Paddy’s stately importance within the Warlpiri community, the deferral to his ancestral knowledge, his advancing years, combined with the impact and cultural significance of the doors, make this particular exhibition a once in a lifetime experience. This is not a show to miss. This is a show that will make an irreversible impression on your understanding and appreciation of culture, art and Aboriginal civilization.

Colourful, brightly painted works, with important iconographical content, will rest side by side, providing the audience with a map of the sacred and important spiritual sites and ceremonies of the Warlpiri people; something rarely seen in this concentrated context.

The exhibition opens on Wednesday February 15th and runs till Saturday March 31st 2012. ReDot Fine Art Gallery invites anyone fascinated by indigenous art and culture to step into a world that is familiar in its simplicity but memorizing in its depth and wonder. The living stories virtually leap off each canvas.

The ReDot Fine Art Gallery is excited to hold its annual Stock Room Show (Part 2) as we welcome the new year and bring a little from each of our art centre relationships, be it a small gem from the desert or a majestic masterpiece from one of our Top End centres. We’ve spent some time rummaging around in our vast storeroom just for you!

With so many exciting pieces to choose from, it wasn’t easy to narrow the selection down, but we are very confident that we’ve chosen the best of our best to bring you for our Stock Room Show (Part 2) commencing on the 10th of January.

It is a great way to find a unique and striking gift for that special someone, or even a little something for you as a treat to celebrate the New Year!

The vibrant colours and stunning palettes that make up our stock room show will be the perfect way to blow away the post festive period cobwebs. Stop by January 10th through February 11th to see what we have up!

The ReDot Fine Art Gallery is excited to hold its annual Stock Room Show as we close out the year and bring a little from each of our art centre relationships, be it a small gem from the desert or a majestic masterpiece from one of our Top End centres. We’ve spent some time rummaging around in our vast storeroom just for you to help make buying that something special at Christmas that little bit easier!

With so many exciting pieces to choose from, it wasn’t easy to narrow the selection down, but we are very confident that we’ve chosen the best of our best to bring you for our Christmas Stock room show commencing on the 7th of December and other pearls for our welcome to 2012 Stockroom show which opens on the 4th of January.

It is a great way to find a unique and striking gift for that special someone during the festive season, or even a little something for you as a treat for what has been a difficult and long year!

The vibrant colours and stunning palettes that make up our stock room shows will be the perfect way to kick off the holiday season and then blow away the post festive period cobwebs. Stop by Wednesday December 14th from 12:30 onwards for a bit of holiday cheer on our opening day and also share a glass of mulled wine and some seasonal treats.

If it’s not a painting you are after but you still can’t think of what to get that special someone for the holidays how about coming to our first ever Christmas Bazaar too! For those tired of the same old mass produced products ReDot Fine Art Gallery will celebrate the festive season by inviting a selected group of vendors to bring their exclusive products to our inaugural Christmas Bazaar.

These vendors include, Fair and Square with Recycled Glass products from rural Indonesia, Thai Spa products and Christmas Decoration handcrafted in Northern Thailand hill tribe communities; FIREHORSE, a contemporary jewellery collection gathered from around the world; Patch Magic showcasing fashion wear made from retro Japanese kimonos, obis, and wedding gowns; Source 53 representing international artists and designers from Africa, Latin American and Asia; Talking Textiles aiming to invoke conversations through the stylised designs of everyday objects; Wine Directions with a nice selection of white, rose and red wines at different price categories that will suit any budget and any moment; and Vivian Pei bringing a selection of Christmas Treats that will sure bring smiles to everyone’s faces – young or old!

We hope to make this an annual event and a relaxing, exquisite shopping experience for all. Kids are welcome too; we will have a small painting section to entertain them and keep them busy as you browse the array of products on offer and delicious sugar treats to tempt them into good behaviour.

The Bazaar dates are Friday 2nd and 9th December 2011 from 12pm to 7pm.

The ReDot Fine Art Gallery is proud to welcome back the beautiful works from Australia’s foremost Aboriginal owned art centre, Papunya Tula Artists Pty Ltd. This exhibition will represent the 8thshowing in Singapore of the stunning work by the desert masters.

This year’s show, Pintupi Men, focuses on the work by five male Papunya Tula artists, showcasing a selection of stunning recent works by both senior and emerging artists from the Kintore and Kiwirrkura communities. This exhibition boldly honours the traditions of the company’s founding artists and shareholders of the early 1970’s.

Ray James TJANGALA, Matthew WEST TJUPURRULA, Morris GIBSON TJAPALTJARRI, Nyilyari TJAPANGATI and Patrick TJUNGURRAYI epitomize the integrity and success of Papunya Tula Artists. Ranging from 35 to around 75yrs of age, these men carry custodial responsibilities for important sites in the western desert region of central Australia. Their significant role within Papunya Tula Artists places them at the forefront of the modern Aboriginal art movement.

These artists, together with other Pintupi men, are the custodians of important sacred sites relating to the Tingari Song Cycle. The Tingari Men were a group of ancestral people who travelled over vast areas of the Western Desert, performing rituals and creating or "opening up" the country. They were usually accompanied by recently-initiated novices to whom they provided ceremonial instruction relating to the cultural law of the region.

The adventures of the Tingari people are enshrined in numerous song cycles which provide explanations for contemporary customs in Western Desert Aboriginal life.

At the many sites that make up these songlines, groups of Tingari people held ceremonies, experienced adversity and had adventures, in the course of which they either created or became the physical features of the sites involved. The oral narratives that describe these adventures stretch to thousands of verses, and provide countless topographical details that would assist nomadic bands to navigate and survive in the arid landscape.

Come and see the work of some of Australia’s most celebrated Aboriginal artists and learn more about their ancestral stories. The roundels, lines and interlocking designs embedded in their paintings tell you of these ancient rituals. Soft natural colours, bold secretive brush movements and traditional iconography all act to preserve the sacred and important stories of Australia’s western desert.

The exhibition opens on Wednesday 19th October and runs till Wednesday 30th November 2011 and it is a must see for anyone interested in following the “songlines” of Papunya Tula Artists, one of the Aboriginal art movements most important art centers. The show will be opened by Mr. Paul Sweeney, General Manager of Papunya Tula Artists Pty Ltd.

The ReDot Fine Art Gallery is proud to welcome back the natural ochre artworks of the famous Warmun Art Centre. After two very successful exhibitions in 2008-09, unique canvases from the Warmun Art Centre will again be gracing the walls of the ReDot Fine Art Gallery, reigniting interest in the lands surrounding Turkey Creek in the East Kimberley, far Northeast of Western Australia.

The show will focus on recent works by Lena Nyadbi and Patrick Mung Mung, two senior artists from the Warmun community, together with a few hand-picked works by other senior artists, who each depict their landscape of rugged terrain, extravagant in colour and forms.

To these Gija artists, the country around Warmun is their home, the place of their Ancestors and the secrets that explain how life is meant to be. Whilst being unmistakably Australian, the Kimberly landscape is unique and the same can be said of the art of the Gija who live and work in the East Kimberley community of Warmun.

From across Australia, Nyadbi and Mung Mung were recently chosen to represent the best of Indigenous artists in the 2011 Art Gallery of Western Australia’s prestigious Indigenous Art Awards. In September, Singapore’s art lovers will be privileged to experience these artists’ works for themselves. The rich colours of the dramatic landforms of their homelands are reflected literally in the works themselves. Warmun artists paint using earth coloured rocks and ochres, collected from their country by hand, crushed to powder at the Art Centre with mortar and pestle and bound with fixatives to give a richly textured finish that has to be seen to be truly appreciated.

Nyadbi tells the story of how she helped one of the first and earliest Warmun painters, Rover Thomas, to prepare his canvases and paint the large fields of black for which he became famous: rubbing the ochres or charcoal with her hand or a stone to create the textures which have become the hallmark of their fame. Mung Mung draws his inspiration from his country, the stories of his forebears and the times he spent in the saddle as a stockman on Texas Downs station to the east of Warmun. As he intimately learned his country from horseback, Patrick Mung Mung now ‘walks’ around his paintings and the land forms familiar in his mind.

Both Nyadbi and Mung Mung, and other senior artists whose work will be displayed alongside, grew up on the cattle stations, working hard and learning some of the white man’s ways whilst still retaining cultural connections that bind them to Ancestral lands, the landscape and the stories of its creation whose power still inspires every one of their paintings. The discipline learned from station life and cultural teachings has stayed with them to today and gives them the strength and resilience to carry on despite whatever hardship and sorrow is thrown their way.

Together the paintings in their Singapore exhibition at ReDot Fine Art Gallery will represent some of the best of Warmun art. Immerse yourself in this art and feel the rhythms of the land that inspired them.  Artists Lena Nyadbi and Mabel Juli will be attending the opening to add to the proceedings along with Art Centre Manager, Maggie Fletcher.

ReDot Fine Art Gallery is proud to present our annual show of the colourful works of the Warlayirti Artists Aboriginal Corporation.

Warlayirti Artists is located in Balgo, in the arid north east of Western Australia, between the Great Sandy and Tanami Deserts. As a midpoint between Alice Springs and Broome, this remote community, originally known as Balgo Hills, was established as a Catholic mission in 1939. Its 400 inhabitants are mostly Kukatja speakers, but seven main languages can be found here, making it a rich cultural and religious area, steeped in history.

Warlayirti Artists represents more than 350 artists across three communities in the Kutjungka region. Some of Australia’s leading contemporary artists as well as a large number of promising young pretenders are producing bright pieces with deceiving simple compositions. These creations harbour complex stories of the landscape and cycles of life of the desert.

Warlayirti Artists was established in 1987 with the employment of an art-coordinator, following the success of the first exhibition of Balgo art titled, “Paintings from the Great Sandy Desert,” featured at the Art Gallery of Western Australia in 1986. However, the first public paintings by Balgo artists were banners completed in 1981 for the celebration of Father Piele’s Silver Jubilee. Following this, people began painting on canvas board through the Catholic run Wirrumanu Adult Education and Training Centre.

Since those humble beginnings the organisation has grown significantly and the artists represented by Warlayirti Artists have emerged as some of Australia’s leading contemporary indigenous artists. As a result Warlayirti Artists contributes significantly to the social, cultural and economic well-being of the Indigenous residents of the Kutjungka region. It is the only organisation in the region that offers indigenous people the opportunity to actively participate in the market economy.

Balgo artworks have gained a reputation for their boldness and vigor, commanding respect wherever they are exhibited. Artists like Eubena Nampitjin, Elizabeth Nyumi, Tjumpo Tjapanangka, Boxer Milner and Helicopter Tjungurrayi paved the way for the new generation of talents. Some have now departed but the success and future of the community has been firmly cemented by the emergence of these new stars such as Christine Yukenbarri, Theresa Nowee, Imelda Gugaman and Pauline Sunfly to name but a few, all ensuring that Warlayirti Artists will flourish into the new century.

The Art of Indigenous Australia is one of the oldest, richest and most complex forms of creative expression in human history. Indigenous people across the continent have been representing their social history, spiritual beliefs and cultural practices in a visually creative fashion since time immemorial. The designs, patterns and stories were taught to Aboriginal people by the ancestors and reinforced and replicated through ritual, dance, song, body paint for ceremony, rock engravings and paintings and on domestic and ritual objects.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art is as much alive today as it was 60,000 years ago. As in the ancient past, the art is not separable from everyday life. It is lively and positive art that describes and engages the world in a variety of ways.

The Art of Indigenous Australians today takes on many forms. Despite significant change and diversity, the art retains an underlying unity of inspiration – the land and human relationships that are associated with it. It has solid links with the past but is firmly positioned as political, social and creative action in the present.

This event is STRICTLY by invitation only and a private event arranged by the NUS Office of Alumni Relations and The China Society, sponsored by the Shaw Foundation and supported by ReDot Fine Art Gallery.