Category Archives: Indigenous art

Venice Biennale 2024: Australian pavilion to explore colonisation, incarceration and First Nations resilience

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Australian artist Archie Moore will draw from his personal history – and databases including Guardian Australia’s Deaths Inside – to create a ‘site for quiet reflection’

Queensland-based artist Archie Moore has unveiled his intention for Australia’s national pavilion at the Venice Biennale in April: to transform it into an examination of the impact of colonisation and incarceration on the country’s First Peoples and a celebration of their resilience.

Moore is only the second First Nations artist to make a solo presentation in the 25-year history of Venice’s Australian pavilion, following Tracey Moffatt in 2017. While key details of the exhibition were still being kept under wraps at the press briefing on Thursday, Moore said in a statement that his exhibition – titled kith and kin – would be a “site for quiet reflection and remembrance”. It will draw on his Kamilaroi, Bigambul, British and Scottish heritage and present his family story as a distillation of Australia’s 254-year colonial history.

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Art world split over NGA name change for one of Australia’s greatest female painters

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Curators of new exhibition say decision was made in consultation with artist’s family and dismiss claims move is ‘paternalistic’

Two art world figures pivotal in the career of Australia’s most internationally lauded female painter have spoken out against the decision by the National Gallery of Australia to adopt a new spelling of her name.

The Emily Kam Kngwarray retrospective which opened at the NGA in Canberra earlier this month is the first major exhibition of the artist, who died in 1996, to use the new spelling.

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Woman who defaced Frederick McCubbin painting in Woodside protest fined $2,637

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Joana Partyka admitted painting company logo on to the masterpiece Down on His Luck in protest at Burrup Peninsula development

A woman who defaced one of Australia’s most famous paintings in a protest against a gas company’s alleged destruction of Western Australia rock art has faced court.

Joana Veronika Partyka, 37, pleaded guilty on Friday to criminal damage after she spray-painted a Woodside Energy logo onto Frederick McCubbin’s work Down on His Luck at the Art Gallery of WA.

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‘The government has listened’: Australia’s peak bodies praise $300m federal arts policy

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Launched by Anthony Albanese at Melbourne live music pub the Espy, the policy offers welcome support for the beleaguered industry

Australia’s arts industry has welcomed the federal government’s $300m national cultural policy Revive, which was launched on Monday by the prime minister, Anthony Albanese.

Albanese described it as a comprehensive and inclusive way to enhance the lives of all Australians, “from the gallery, to the mosh pit, to your favourite reading chair”. While most of the major policies were released over the weekend, the official launch, held at Melbourne live music venue the Esplanade, revealed a few more details, such as the establishment of a national poet laureate – a position Australia has not had since the convict era – and the commitment to deliver a state of culture report every three years, similar to the government-issued state of the environment report.

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Ancient Aboriginal rock art destroyed by vandals in ‘tragic loss’ at sacred SA site

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Archeologist says artwork was ‘unique in Australia’, calling for better protection at Koonalda Cave

Vandals have destroyed a 30,000-year-old artwork at a sacred cave in South Australia, as experts decried the “massive, tragic loss” and expressed frustration at the lack of protection at the site.

The vandals entered Koonalda Cave at Nullarbor Plain and scrawled graffiti across the heritage-listed site, writing “don’t look now, but this is a death cave”.

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Brisbane-based Indigenous art collective proppaNOW wins prestigious global prize

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Curator at school which awards Jane Lombard Prize says the artists’ work would ‘galvanise arts and social justice communities’ in New York


Indigenous Australian art collective proppaNOW has won a prestigious prize that will take them to New York next year after the selecting jury found their practices would serve as “models for political empowerment throughout the world”.

But don’t expect traditional Aboriginal artworks.

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Stolen Tasmanian Aboriginal artefacts are finally home. But there’s a catch: they’re only on loan

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Cultural objects kept in museums around the world are in nipaluna/Hobart for an exhibition. But Aboriginal communities are calling for them to stay permanently

In 2014, pakana woman Zoe Rimmer left the British Museum in tears after viewing a 170-year-old kelp water carrier taken from lutruwita/Tasmania in their collection. As she cried, the seed of a big idea was planted: how could she get the rikawa, and other Tasmanian Aboriginal cultural artefacts sitting in institutions across the world, home?

“Seeing our ancestral belongings in a storage facility in the British Museum was quite emotional,” says Rimmer, who until recently was senior curator of First Peoples art and culture at the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery (TMAG).

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Fears for Indigenous rock art as construction begins on WA’s Burrup peninsula

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Ex-chair of Murujuga Aboriginal Corporation says hydrogen plant, gas facility and proposed urea plant are all threats to cultural sites

Traditional custodians fighting to protect ancient rock art on the Burrup peninsula have raised concerns that construction work has begun at multiple sites despite the federal government ordering a cultural heritage assessment of the area.

The peninsula in northern Western Australia is home to industrial operations including of the country’s largest gas producer Woodside, the Yara Pilbara ammonia plant and a proposed urea plant by Indian company Perdaman.

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How an Indigenous Australian artist ‘astonished’ a giant of American art

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Sol LeWitt never met Emily Kame Kngwarreye, who began painting in her 80s, but he was blown away by her work. A new AGNSW show celebrates their unlikely link

He was one of the 20th century’s pioneers of modern American art; she was the Anmatyerre artist who put Australian desert painting on the world stage.

Sol LeWitt and Emily Kame Kngwarreye never met, yet one had a profound effect on the work of the other, and led to one of the largest collections of Utopia art outside Australia. LeWitt became a huge fan of Kngwarreye, and of the distinct style produced by the Indigenous Australian artists working in Utopia, Northern Territory.

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Dropping plans for Indigenous cultural centre at Barangaroo a ‘backward’ step, Aboriginal leaders say

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NSW government under fire after scrapping proposed standalone venue at the Cutaway site

The New South Wales government has come under fire for its decision to cancel plans for an Indigenous cultural centre at Barangaroo’s enormous Cutaway site.

A number of feasibility studies and concept designs had been undertaken on the proposal for the subterranean landmark site, housing almost 5,500 sq metres of space. Wesley Enoch, an artist and playwright, and Rhoda Roberts, the head of Sydney Opera House’s Indigenous programming for nearly a decade, were among the First Nations arts leaders involved in the project.

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Tanya Plibersek urged to protect Indigenous rock art up to 50,000 years old by blocking fertiliser plant

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Previous environment minister, Sussan Ley, declined to issue emergency protection to halt $4.5bn development on Western Australia’s Burrup peninsula

The incoming federal environment minister has been urged to block the construction of a fertiliser plant on a world heritage-nominated site in Western Australia, and to act swiftly to stop the multinational company behind the plans from removing Indigenous rock art.

Perdaman is planning a $4.5bn plant on the Burrup Peninsula, in the Pilbara region. The plant, which is strongly supported by the state government and was backed by the former federal government, will require the removal of Aboriginal art produced over a period starting about 50,000 years ago.

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Bangarra’s Stephen Page and artist Destiny Deacon win $50,000 lifetime achievement awards

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Page and Deacon both won the Red Ochre prizes at the 2022 First Nations Arts awards on Friday night for their life work

Last year, choreographer, dancer and director Stephen Page announced that he was stepping down as artistic director of Bangarra Dance Theatre, after 31 years in the job. On Friday night, Page was named the recipient of a $50,000 lifetime achievement award, at the Australia Council’s First Nations Arts awards – and it could not have come at a more opportune moment.

The descendant of the Nunukul people and the Mununjali clan of the Yugambeh nation in south-east Queensland, Page has created more than two dozen works for Bangarra over the past three decades and won many accolades, including being named an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO). Now, it is time to take a break.

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147 razor cuts: bloody artwork marking Indigenous deaths in custody wins Australia’s Blake prize

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Wiradjuri artist SJ Norman has won $35,000 prize for Cicatrix (All that was taken, all that remains), which saw him receive 147 wounds in 147 minutes

  • Readers may find images in this story distressing

Wiradjuri artist SJ Norman has won the 2022 Blake prize for an artwork that saw him receive 147 wounds to his back, representing the number of Aboriginal deaths in police custody over the last decade in Australia.

Norman was announced the winner of the $35,000 prize at Sydney’s Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre on Saturday, for his performance piece and photographic diptych titled Cicatrix (All that was taken, all that remains).

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Fertiliser company urged to halt plans to remove Burrup Peninsula Indigenous rock art

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Environment minister Sussan Ley asks Perdaman not to go ahead until a review is carried out after traditional owners raise concerns

The federal government has asked a multinational fertiliser company to stop work on plans to remove Indigenous rock art from a world heritage-nominated area in the Burrup Peninsula after traditional owners raised concerns.

Perdaman is planning to build a $4.5bn fertiliser plant in Western Australia’s Burrup Peninsula. The company is already contracted to buy gas used to make the fertiliser from Woodside Energy’s Scarborough gas field.

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‘Beginnings got lost’: fabled Aboriginal art on show 40 years after disappearance

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Important paintings lay forgotten in storage since the early 80s until their discovery, muddy and mouldy, but intact

Balgo is Country for all of us now. We were all born here, these generations here today. We are Wirrimanu kids. We belong to Balgo. That’s what we paint. That’s why we paint. This is our story.”
– Warlayirti artist Eva Nagomarra

John Carty opened his email and downloaded the images. They were photos of paintings, found in a shipping container somewhere in the Kimberley. They were muddy and water damaged, but recognisable.

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Two decades of Indigenous photography: the work of Wayne Quilliam – in pictures

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For more than 20 years, Aboriginal photographer Wayne Quilliam has captured significant Indigenous events across Australia, from the national apology to the Stolen Generations to the Garma, Barunga and Yeperenye festivals. In his travels through country, Quilliam often visits communities to teach Indigenous youth how to capture their own lives through a lens. His book, Culture is Life, is a modern, photographic celebration of the diversity of Indigenous Australians

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BHP to destroy at least 40 Aboriginal sites, up to 15,000 years old, to expand Pilbara mine

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Exclusive: WA minister gave consent to BHP plan just three days after Juukan Gorge site was blown up by Rio Tinto in a move that has horrified the public

Mining giant BHP Billiton is poised to destroy at least 40 – and possibly as many as 86 – significant Aboriginal sites in the central Pilbara to expand its $4.5bn South Flank iron ore mining operation, even though its own reports show it is aware that the traditional owners are deeply opposed to the move.

In documents seen by Guardian Australia, a BHP archaeological survey identified rock shelters that were occupied between 10,000 and 15,000 years ago and noted that evidence in the broader area showed “occupation of the surrounding landscape has been ongoing for approximately 40,000 years”.

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