Exhibitions

The ‘Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Award’ is the premier Australian indigenous event on the arts calendar. It sets the benchmark for the market and attracts collector from all over the world.

The award was established by the Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory in 1984 and it is open to all adult Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists. The 26th Telstra Art Award opened last month in Darwin and 93 entries competed for AUD56,000 of prize money. ReDot Gallery was present at the prize ceremony and is proud to represent 35 of the 93 entries in this year’s award.

‘Stock Room Show – 2009 TELSTRA Award Selected Artists’ will showcase works by these artists and give our clients the opportunity to see works from top artists from all corners of Australia. Canvases from the Central and Western Deserts will be showcased alongside ceremonial poles and bark paintings from the Top End.

An eclectic selection showing the directions this broad art movement is taking. Billy Benn, Donald Moko, Doreen Reid Nakamarra, Eubena Nampitjin, Harry Tjutjuna, Jukuja Dolly Snell, Lydia Balbal, Maringka Baker and Cory Surprise are just some names whose works will grace the walls of ReDot Gallery.

The exhibition opens on Wednesday 6th October and runs till Saturday 7th November 2009.

The ReDot gallery is proud to welcome for the 2nd time in Singapore, the beautiful and colourful works of the Warlukurlangu Artists’ Aboriginal Association, located 300km northwest of Alice Springs at Yuendumu in the Northern Territory.

Yuendumu is the largest community of Warlpiri people, home to about 1000 today, and they have been working with acrylic paint on canvas for more than three decades creating distinctive and unique works in a variety of styles. Some artists produce work using a full palette of vibrant colours and heavily textured surfaces as seen in the art works of renowned Judy Watson Napangardi, whilst other artists produce fine work with highly patterned and delicate dots and lines and often use only the traditional colours. Others still incorporate strong traditional iconic images.

Despite the differing execution, at all times Yuendumu art remains traditional in its themes. The central focus is the very significant site at Karntaklurlangu, located north of Yuendumu in a fertile area defined by two large pans and numerous water soakages. This is the sacred Mina Mina site and the ancestral home for the Napangardi and Napanangka family groups. Many of these family groups produce art works that depict this journey of their ancestors as they crossed the desert to reach the Mina Mina site. Even today the Warlpiri women regularly gather at this site in a ceremony to re-enact this Dreaming story. Here they paint each other’s bodies with Dreaming designs and chant and dance the age old creation story.

The history of the community dates back to 1946 when the ’Native Affairs Branch’ established Yuendumu as a rationing and welfare depot. Many people were moved from their traditional lands into this community and Baptist Missionaries arrived in 1947 and set about converting Aborigines to Christianity.

The roots of the art centre can be traced back to anthropologists Francoise Dussart and Meredith Morris as they pursued their research and recording of women’s body painting designs in the early 1980’s. They introduced new painting materials which were greeted positively by a group of about 30 women who painted objects to sell so they could buy themselves a...yes you guessed it... four wheel drive!

The men soon followed the ladies lead! In 1984, five artists, including Paddy Japaljarri Stewart, Paddy Japaljarri Sims and Roy Jupurrurla Curtis (other artists are deceased) painted thirty doors of the Yuendumu school with 27 major Dreaming designs, negotiating the content with other Warlpiri men and women who also collectively owned the designs. Thus the first ‘real’ canvasses were not on linen but on doors, a set of works which are now world famous.

The entire series of Yuendumu Doors, referring to more than two hundred sites in Warlpiri and Anmatyerre territory, was acquired by the South Australian Museum in 1995 and then restored. Twelve of the best doors were selected for a travelling exhibition that toured Australia for three years and have been featured in many exhibitions around the globe and reproduced in many publications.

The 1st exhibition of Yuendumu paintings was held in 1985 at Sydney’s Hogarth Gallery. As the show’s press release indicated, the paintings stood out from much other desert art as they were ’less contrived, freer and less stylised than other desert paintings... the effect... more contemporary, even post modernist, in the striking application of colour’. The sales at the exhibition of a large night sky painting to the National Gallery of Australia for $3,000 (along with other smaller works) enabled the establishment of the artists’ cooperative.

Warlukurlangu means "belonging to fire" in Warlpiri, and is named after a Fire Dreaming west of Yuendumu. The name of the art centre form a reference to the vibrancy of the paintings and the profusion of colours used by these artists to depict stories of the Tjukurrpa or Dreaming of the Warlpiri and Anmatyerre people.

In 1989 Warlukurlangu went international when 6 artists were invited to exhibit a large 10 x 4 metre ground painting called Yarla as part of the exhibition Magiciens de la Terre at the Pompidou Centre in Paris, France. Since then the rise has been meteoric, with many more shows, in excess of 100, culminating this year alone with trips to India, China, Bahrain and USA - Washington DC, Texas and Virginia at the prestigious Kluge-Ruhe - as well as a packed domestic calendar of shows.

Warlukurlangu Artists was formed to support the community; this was an essential and overriding objective. Initially it had 90 artists on its books, today over 450 artists living in the communities of Yuendumu and Nyirrpi (160km southwest of Yuendumu) are involved in the production of gloriously colourful acrylic paintings and fine limited-edition prints and earning a living to sustain their traditional indigenous lives.

Fully indigenously owned and governed, one hundred percent of the proceeds from the sale of the art works go directly back to the artists and their community projects. The art centre is both a stronghold of traditional Warlpiri culture and an essential part of Yuendumu’s community life. A truly incredible success story in the harsh outback lands of Australia.

This exhibition will showcase works of world renowned artists such as Judy Napangardi Watson, Liddy Napanangka Walker, Shorty Jangala Robertson, Paddy Japanangka Lewis and Bessie Nakamarra Sims to name but a few, along with some new and exciting debutants on the international Aboriginal art scene.

World renowned Warlukurlangu Artists Judy Watson Napangardi, emerging star Alma Nungarrayi Granites, coming to the lion city for the second time, accompanied by Cecilia Alfonso, the art centre manager will be opening the show at ReDot Gallery on Wednesday 26th August.

The ReDot gallery is proud to welcome the 1st Singaporean show for the powerful and colourful works of the Bentinck Island Art Gang.

“Ngalla marraaju wuuju dulka kilwanmaruthu / we’ll show you our country” will showcase the very best from this group of the Kaiadilt women painting on Mornington Island.

Mornington and Bentinck are part of the Wellesley Islands, a group of twenty three islands off the cost of north Queensland, Australia, in the Gulf of Carpentaria.

The combined population was estimated to be 1007 as of 2001 and the majority of the citizens live in the township of Gununa.

Bentinck, in the Southern part of the group, has an extremely flat landscape, very vulnerable to inundation caused by the large volume of water getting into the Gulf during the monsoon season and by tides up to 4 metres high.

The Kaiadilt group lived a very traditional and isolated life until 1947 when a cyclone forced the evacuation of Bentinck Island when the water was contaminated.

They were moved to nearby Mornington Island and settled in a religious mission where they kept their traditional practices of fishing and gathering bush foods.

However the stress of leaving their country was so extreme that for many years no Kaiadilt babies were born and their language started to die.

These days fewer than 10 people can speak their original language.

The art movement that brought life back to these people started in 2005 when Sally Gabori, then 80 years old, wandered into the Mornington Island Arts and Craft centre and picked up a brush.

The Kaiadilt had no tradition of painting but what came from her hands was an overflow of talent in blocks of bright colour, bold combination of pinks and oranges, blues and reds, white and black.

Sally was shortly followed by May Moodoonuthi, Dawn Naranatjil, Paula Paul, Netta Loogatha, Ethel Thomas and Amy Loogatha.

All somehow related by blood, language and by the experience of the life in the low lands of the nearby island. They all have distinctive styles but the themes are common: the salt pans, mangroves, mussels, oysters, fish traps, shells and sand from the casuarinas lined beaches and the ceremonial scars made when someone related dies.

The Kaiadilt ladies of the Bentinck Island seized the art world’s attention and have found a new way to reconnect to their long left country.

The powerful works of these wonderful ladies has now been exhibited regularly around Australia since 2005 and are collected by important institutions and collection including The National Gallery of Victoria, Edith Cowan University, Chartwell Collection, The Merenda Collection, The Lagerberg-Swift Collection, The Marshall Collection, Leeuwin Estate, Harding Family and Musee du Quai Branly to name but a few.

Today most of them return to Bentinck during the dry season and about 15 people live permanently on the island.

These ladies are respected by the rest of their Kaiadilt people as they hold most of the knowledge of their people and their arts is a vital instrument to spreading this knowledge.

ReDot is very proud to be the 1st gallery in Asia to exhibit these beautiful works and continue to mission of bringing the newest, most innovative, colourful new Aboriginal art works from the Australian outback.

The works will be on show from the 8th of July  until the 22nd of August.

The ReDot gallery is proud to welcome back the natural ochre artworks of the famous Warmun Art Centre.

After a very successful 1st exhibition in June 2008, the unique canvases of this Kimberley community will again be gracing the walls of the Gallery as we reignite interest in the lands surrounding Turkey Creek in the East Kimberley’s, far Northeast of Western Australia.

Warmun, home to leading indigenous artists Rover Thomas, Queenie McKenzie, Hector Jandany and Jack Britten has long been recognized as a ‘trend setter’ in the bustling world of modern Aboriginal art.

The art centre, established in 1998, has quickly become a “must see” stop on any outback journey.

The dream of the older artists, particularly Queenie and Hector, was to open an art centre at Warmun to provide greater opportunities for the development of younger Gija artists, as well as opportunities to communicate their culture to tourists in the region.

This did not happen easily at the start as the art centre struggled to overcome the deaths of these iconic early painters and law people, and the promotion of newer emerging artists proved difficult and often forlorn.

Over this decade, and especially in the last few years, the fruit of the community’s hard work has started to bear wonderful fruit.

When Mabel Juli was interviewed in July 2000 she commented on Queenie McKenzie’s commitment to establishing an art centre at Warmun.

“That was the dream of that old lady to make people happy with all the art.”

The subsequent years have seen this dream become a reality by the active pursuit of this goal by senior artists such as Lena Nyadbi, Patrick Mung Mung, Shirley Purdie, Jock Mosquito, Madigan Thomas, Gordon Barney, Mick Jawalji, Churchill Cann, Betty Carrington and Mabel herself! ALL now feature in major collections of indigenous artworks around the world and Lena adorns the walls of the breathtaking Musee du Quai, Branly in Paris.

These senior artists have studiously been passing on to the current generation of artists many of the traditional stories and painting techniques of the Ngarrangkarni (Dreaming) and this show will showcase the works of these senior artists alongside works of new emerging artists such as Roseleen Park, Lorraine Daylight, Roberta Daylight, Gabriel Nodea, Benita Everett, Letoya Evans.

Just a few of the group of more than sixty emerging and younger artists currently painting for the art centre.

The early concerns of survival have given way to a thriving and growing Indigenous business and the current show will ensure the continued success of this magical place now entering into its 2nd decade! The establishment of the Warmun art centre was to be a reassertion of control by the Warmun community over the production and distribution of their culture – that goal has been resoundingly achieved.

The works will be on show for the 20th of May until the 27th of June.

The ReDot Gallery, in collaboration with Short Street Gallery, is proud to welcome the 1st Singaporean show for the exciting works of the Yulparija and Mangala artists of Bidyadanga.

“FROM DESERT TO SALTWATER COUNTRY” will showcase the very best from this art community whose ancestral lands lay in the Great Sandy Desert but who paint in a beautiful colonial bungalow in Broome.

Dating back to the 1960’s, a group of Yulparija women and men left their traditional country around Well 33 on the Canning Stock Route in search of water as a severe drought had left their Great Sandy Desert country desolate and people where dying.

There was little option but to walk out and they headed to Le Grange Mission, now known as Bidyadanga, two hours south of Broome in the traditional saltwater country of the Karrajarri people.

The story of their current art making is much more recent however, dating back to mid-1999 when a thin, delicate young man, only 16 at the time, walked in to the little Short Street Gallery in Broome’s Chinatown, and approached its owner, proclaiming "I am an artist, and there are old people in my community who need to paint."

The young man in question, Daniel Walbidi, could not have anticipated the appetite and applause the works of this small group of painters would receive and the impact his actions would have on all of their lives.

The extraordinary works of the Yulparija artists reflect the contemporary experiences of these people, with desert iconography being portrayed in the rich blues and reds and greens of the coastal landscape that the artists have been living in for the past 35 years.

Established artists Donald Moko, Jan Billycan, Lydia Balbal and Weaver Jack will be exhibited along with works of more emerging talents such as Margaret Baragurra, Mary Meribida and Susie Gilbert.

There will also be work by Daniel Walbidi himself! "Without him," says Emily Rohr, Director of Short Street Gallery, Bidyadanga art would never have happened.

The community have exhibited regularly around Australia and overseas, and have been widely collected by important institutions and collectors, including National Gallery of Victoria, Laverty Collection, RACV Collection, Myer Collection, Kerry Stokes Collection, University of Notre Dame, National Gallery of Australia, the Art Gallery of Western Australia and many others.

The ReDot gallery is proud to welcome the 1st international show for the exciting works of Martumili Artists.

‘Yankuni laju karnkani kujungka’ (We are traveling together by air) will showcase the very best from this relatively new, remote, art community.

Martumili represents artists from the communities of Jigalong, Parnngurr, Punmu, Kunawarritji (Canning Stock Route Well 33), Irrungadji (Nullagine) and Parnpajinya (Newman) in the Western Australia’s remote east Pilbara region.

Martumili translates to ’all Martu together’ and the Martu people are the traditional custodians of a vast area of the Great Sandy, Little Sandy and Gibson Deserts.

Their country stretches from the Percival Lakes in the north, to Lake Disappointment in the south, and runs east across the Canning Stock Route to the WA/NT border.

The strength of Martu artists’ commitment to artistic practice is visible not only in their artwork, but also in the markedly independent, rigorous and practical path Martu people followed in establishing Martumili Artists.

Making artworks, and managing the ways those artworks are sold and exhibited are key ways in which Martu people are working to keep their culture strong.

Martumili Artists have rapidly established a reputation for very fine art that is rich in story and arresting for its innovation and freshness.

Demand for their work is strong and there are waiting lists for some of their leading artists’ work.

A group of Martu artists will be traveling from the Desert in the remote East Pilbara to Singapore to attend the exhibition opening.

The ReDot gallery is proud to welcome the 1st ever show in Asia for the exciting works of APY Lands’ Tjungu Palya.

Tjungu Palyaku Walka Nyuwana (New Works from Tjungu Palya), will showcase the very best from this relatively new, remote, art community.

Tjungu Palya represents artists from the homeland settlements of Nyapari, Kanpi and Watarru, located in the far north-west corner of South Australia close to the Western Australian and Northern Territory borders.

It is home to the Anangu (Aboriginal people), speakers of the Pitjantjatjara and Ngaanyatjarra languages.

As children, the now senior Tjungu Palya artists lived a traditional nomadic life travelling in small family groups.

Their traditional lifestyle continued until the 1930s, when desert people were migrated to Ernabella and Warburton missions, initially as a result of the assimilation policy of the day but also due to terrible drought and the atomic testing at Maralinga.

The desire to return to their own country remained critical to the community elders throughout this time, and by the 1960s families began returning to their lands and establishing small remote settlements.

In spite of the interruption, the extreme remoteness of this area and the continued connection to the land has contributed to the maintenance of an Aboriginal lifestyle rich in ceremonies and traditional observances.

The remoteness also meant that established art support was not readily available until recently.

The art cooperative of Tjungu Palya was initiated in 2005 to support the art making of the communities.

Tjungu Palya artists have rapidly established a reputation for very fine art that is rich in story and arresting for its innovation and freshness.

Demand for their work is strong and there are waiting lists for some of their leading artists’ work.

Artists such as Wingu Tingima, the late Eileen Yaritja Stevens, Nyankulya Watson, Maringka Baker and Ginger Wikilyiri… all of whom will be exhibited in this colourful show!

Tjungu Palya artists have powerful spiritual links to their country, and produce paintings that are exuberant and highly individual compositions depicting their myth cycles embedded in the topography of the land.

Join us to be mesmerized by this latest journey through the Australian outback!