Kngwarreye, Emily

New Style Develops from Traditional Body Markings

In 1977, as part of an adult literacy course for the women of Utopia, a batik-making fabric workshop was begun. Kngwarreye was a founding member of the group. She adapted the traditional body markings of the awelye and her perceptions of the land itself to the batik fabric. When the group began working with acrylics on canvas, she found the medium most suited to her bold use of color. Her first canvas, Emu woman 1988-89, reproduced on the cover of The Summer Project catalog for the exhibition at the S. H. Ervin Gallery in Sydney in 1989, attracted much attention. In 1990, she had two one-woman shows.

Within three years, her art had been shown in more than 50 exhibitions throughout the world. Between 1989 and her death on September 2, 1996, [Page 816]she completed more than 3,000 paintings. Galleries and private collectors purchased her work for substantial amounts. However, Kngwarreye continued to live a largely traditional life as a senior law woman of her people and uses her income to support her community.

A major retrospective of her work traveled to galleries throughout Australia in the late 1990s, and in 2007, Earth's Creation sold for $1,056,000, breaking the record for work by an indigenous artist. In 2008, an exhibition of Kngwarreye's paintings in Japan drew more than 130,000 people in what had been called the largest single-artist exhibition to travel internationally from Australia. The same exhibit, valued at more than $130 million, appeared at the National Museum of Australia later the same year.

Hailed as a genius, Kngwarreye is difficult to categorize. Some insist she should be viewed solely as an aboriginal artist. Others see her through the lens of abstract impressionism. Margo Neale, curator at the National Museum of Australia, suggests both views are limiting. She terms Kngwarreye a hybrid artist whose power is greater than labels.

...