Writing Tags

TRACEY MOFFATT IS SPIRITED

TRACEY MOFFATT IS SPIRITED

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2014-12-02 12:36:41

When I first arrived in Australia, an early writing commission was to preview the expat playwright Ray Matthew's wonderful outback play, 'Spring Song'. It captured country values and setting perfectly – so well, in fact, that he was whisked off...» Read More

 

LIFE IMITATES ART IMITATES ART AT SELLERS PRIZE

LIFE IMITATES ART IMITATES ART AT SELLERS PRIZE

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2014-07-25 00:12:01

Announced tomorrow is the lucky winner of the $100,000 Basil Sellers Art Prize for a work or works which confront issues and themes in sport. As an enthusiastic press release puts it: “From fandom to fanaticism, motivation to morality, and...» Read More

 

ART IS THE VOICE OF OUR PEOPLE - TAKE 2

ART IS THE VOICE OF OUR PEOPLE - TAKE 2

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2014-07-15 15:28:19

Hetti Perkins second 'Art+Soul' TV series returns to the ABC tonight, and winds up with a third episode next Tuesday. And the question I asked after previewing her first program remains as relevant to the thinking behind this production as...» Read More

 

Monstrous figures in Arnhem Land

Monstrous figures in Arnhem Land

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2014-05-04 16:52:02

There's some impressive writing going on at The Conversation at present - and that's not only from the contributors, check out the feedback as well. The following is an excerpt from Christine Nicholls' latest, Monstrous figures in Arnhem Land, the...» Read More

 

TIWI PANTO

TIWI PANTO

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2014-04-02 10:12:58

It's taken a while to get all of its act together, but the world's first Tiwi Island pantomime is off and touring the country currently. 'Wulamanayuwi and the Seven Pamanui' – a Melville Island-mouthful version of Snow White and the...» Read More

 

MT BUNDY STATEMENT

MT BUNDY STATEMENT

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2014-03-03 12:46:59

The body that represents Aboriginal art centres in the far North - ANKAAA – is being as dynamic as ever. I've reported before on its collaborative efforts to train up Indigenous arts workers by arranging courses and work experience that...» Read More

 

'TOURIST TAT' IN HOBART

'TOURIST TAT' IN HOBART

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2014-01-13 10:52:05

Back in September, I responded to some depressingly bad critical reviews of the Indigenous content in the big Australia show at the Royal Academy in London. My blunt heading then was 'Crap Criticism in London'. Coincidentally, the Hobart art...» Read More

 

THE GANTNER COLLECTION

THE GANTNER COLLECTION

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2013-09-09 18:04:31

Carrillo and Ziyin Gantner are fortunate people in having a) taste and great enthusiasm to collect Indigenous art and b) enough money to do things like flying around remote Aboriginal communities in a private plane in order to see and...» Read More

 

Winner announced for the $25,000 Kate Challis RAKA Award 2013

Winner announced for the $25,000 Kate Challis RAKA Award 2013

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2013-08-15 12:27:43

One of Australia’s most cherished Indigenous artists, Mabel Juli, has won the $25,000 Kate Challis RAKA Award 2013 for her refined, minimal painting Garnkeny Ngarranggarni (Moon Dreaming). A respected Gija elder, 80-year-old Mabel travelled from her home at Warmun in the...» Read More

 

Finalists announced for the $25,000 Kate Challis RAKA Award 2013

Finalists announced for the $25,000 Kate Challis RAKA Award 2013

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2013-06-27 11:15:17

Nine artists have been selected as finalists for the prestigious Kate Challis RAKA Award, to be exhibited at the Ian Potter Museum of Art, from August 10 until November 3, 2013. The shortlisted artists are Teresa Baker (WA), Daniel Boyd (Qld/NSW),...» Read More

 

The 6th Annual National Indigenous Arts Awards

The 6th Annual National Indigenous Arts Awards

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2013-05-27 11:47:22

The multi-talented David Gulpilil OAM has won this year's Red Ochre Award, the highest peer-assessed award for an Indigenous artist with a prize money of $50,000, presented today at the Sydney Opera House as part of the National Indigenous Arts...» Read More

 

ABORIGINAL ART ON STAGE

ABORIGINAL ART ON STAGE

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2013-03-20 20:17:35

It's one hundred years since Stravinsky's Rite of Spring was first heard on May 29, 1913, at Théatre des Champs-Elysées in Paris. Hailed by the Oxford Dictionary of Dance as “a seminal moment in Modernism,” the premiere shocked its audience,...» Read More

 

CREATIVE AUSTRALIA?

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2013-03-13 18:17:39

With wonderful synchronicity, just as I'd been writing about the damaging effects of the last cultural policy – Creative Nation - introduced by the Keating Government in October 1994, a new national cultural policy has belatedly emerged from the current...» Read More

 

Hermannsburg watercolourist, Mervyn Rubuntja's Open Studio

Hermannsburg watercolourist, Mervyn Rubuntja's Open Studio

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2013-02-06 13:40:47

Watercolour landscape artist Mervyn Rubuntja will be travelling to Sydney from Alice Springs for a weekend of events in Sydney in February, which include a painting session at a local gallery and a panel discussion at the State Library of...» Read More

 

First Aboriginal and TSI Playwriting Festival in Sydney for 20 Years

First Aboriginal and TSI Playwriting Festival in Sydney for 20 Years

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2013-01-18 13:14:40

The first Aboriginal playwriting festival in Sydney for over two decades. Yellamundie: National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Playwriting Festival is a landmark writing event which will take place over two weeks from 27 January 2013. The Festival brings together...» Read More

 

The Soul of Emily Kngwarreye

The Soul of Emily Kngwarreye

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2013-01-04 17:20:04

It often seems to be the case that great Australian achievements need the validation of overseas approval. But the fact that 'Utopia : The Genius of Emily Kame Kngwarreye' was a vast tribute in 2008 to the Aboriginal artist conceived...» Read More

 

TIWI - THE BOOK

TIWI - THE BOOK

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2012-12-19 11:26:59

by Jennifer Isaacs, published by the wonderful Miegunyah Press at Melbourne University at $120 It's been an amazing year for Aboriginal art books – never known a better. If only I'd had time to read them all rather than just dip...» Read More

 

Unique Indigenous story teller awarded

Unique Indigenous story teller awarded

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2012-11-26 12:13:57

Indigenous writer, poet and story teller Herb Wharton has been awarded the Australia Council Award for Lifetime Achievement in Literature; a $50,000 award that recognises the achievements of eminent writers who have made outstanding and lifelong contributions to Australian literature....» Read More

 

France continues its Love of Aboriginal Art in Brisbane

France continues its Love of Aboriginal Art in Brisbane

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2012-10-26 11:42:29

The strong, historical links between France and Aboriginal art offer a rich and fertile background – from the research and writing works of French ethnologists and anthropologists to the development of important public Aboriginal art collections in France and the...» Read More

 

Film Noir and Pulp Fiction Bad Girls and.. Larissa Behrendt?

Film Noir and Pulp Fiction Bad Girls and.. Larissa Behrendt?

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2012-10-20 11:32:24

Opening today at the Justice and Police Museum in Sydney is Wicked Women, described as a playful, subversive and wickedly sexy exhibition of new works by prize-winning artist Rosemary Valadon. Inspired by the 'bad-girl' persona from the vibrant early to...» Read More

 

The 29th NATSIAAs

The 29th NATSIAAs

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2012-08-10 15:45:11

“It's a really interesting year, I think – characterised by strong women. Where have artists like Cornelia Tipuamantumeri, Barbara Moore and Rhonda Sharpe suddenly come from? Pow!!” Very new Curator of Indigenous Art at the Museum & Art Gallery of the...» Read More

 

CAT AMONGST THE PIGEONS (2

CAT AMONGST THE PIGEONS (2

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2012-07-04 00:17:03

Sadly, the cat never escaped! Last Saturday's promising discussions at the Sydney Opera House - Aboriginal Art: it’s a white thing and Write the truth, or shut up – turned out to be damp squibs in terms of achieving any...» Read More

 

FOLEY

FOLEY

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2012-01-30 14:44:11

The 40th anniversary last week of the accidental Aboriginal Embassy on the lawns of Old Parliament House in Canberra was as good an opportunity as any to learn how it came about even before the messy events that accompanied it....» Read More

 

Indigenous youth arts project to explore identity

Indigenous youth arts project to explore identity

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2012-01-15 14:43:30

Young Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders in the Sunshine Coast and Gympie regions are being urged to come together to embrace and showcase their culture via song writing and recording, hip-hop dancing and art workshops based on the theme of...» Read More

 

ART & HEALTH IN THE DESERT

ART & HEALTH IN THE DESERT

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2011-12-01 12:06:42

TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN – WITH MONEY! I am writing to excite you with talk about the significance of the art works and colour of the truck. It is 11 years since Pintupi people painted pictures and raised one million...» Read More

 

CIAF 2011

CIAF 2011

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2011-08-23 10:55:26

The third edition of the Cairns Indigenous Art Fair, enjoyed by about 15,000 people in the balmy setting of Cairns in the Spring revealed the constant state of evolution that is Queensland's indigenous art scene. Prime amongst the developments was the...» Read More

 

THE GOOD AND THE BAD IN THE KIMBERLEY

THE GOOD AND THE BAD IN THE KIMBERLEY

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2011-05-04 19:29:01

The East Kimberley was the first place in WA to join the Aboriginal art movement that spread from Papunya in the 1970s. As is well-known, Rover Thomas had a Dream following the awesome devastation of Cyclone Tracey; to share it...» Read More

 

Politics of the Secret

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2010-09-21 20:12:55

Rumors that Vivien Johnson was writing a history of painting at Papunya have been reaching my ears for a long time now. When the publication of Johnson’s Lives of the Papunya Tula Painters was announced in 2008 by IAD...» Read More

 

Joining the Dots: The Sustainability of the Aboriginal Art Market

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2010-07-14 23:17:45

On top of the symposium I’m co-convening at the University of Melbourne next week, with speeches by the Minister for the Arts, Peter Garrett, 2010 Archibald and Wynne winner Sam Leach, and other venerable members of the visual art community,...» Read More

 

ANANGU ART BROUGHT TO BOOK

ANANGU ART BROUGHT TO BOOK

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2010-06-27 19:42:10

“Now, almost forty years after its genesis, the epicentre and dynamic thrust of the Western Desert art movement has dramatically shifted from Papunya, Kintore and Kiwirrkura to Ngaanyatjarra and APY art centres. The untrammelled painting of senior men and women...» Read More

 

Sistagirls Photographic Exhibition @ Nellie Castan Gallery

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2010-06-25 00:08:53

I really hope that you can make the opening or even just pop in for a visit while it's on. I am in the process of making a catalogue which will contain images and writing by Jirra Lulla Harvey...» Read More

 

Clifford Possum Japaltjarri

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2010-06-14 20:59:40

For Art Sunday today, a great Australian artist, Clifford Possum Japaltjarri. Clifford Possum was born in 1932 on Napperby Station. He worked extensively as a stockman on the cattle stations in and around his tribal country. At this time he...» Read More

 

Awards inspire art

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2010-06-02 18:32:50

Two local women are part of a push to promote the diversity of Australia’s Indigenous arts. An established writer from Malabar and an up-and-coming photographer from Chifley were the guests of honour at last week’s Australia Council’s National Indigenous Arts Awards. Dr...» Read More

 

25 May, Artist Talk by David Garneau

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2010-05-19 22:11:36

Australian Aboriginal Art: A Reading Group Artist Talk by David Garneau Visiting Canadian Indigenous Métis artist & curator Apropos Appropriate Appropriations (Art after the Apology) Koorie Heritage Trust, Tuesday, 25 May 2010, 3- 5pm Followed by discussion & coffee. RSVP: reception@koorieheritagetrust.com 295 King Street, Corner...» Read More

 

Mapping Me - Call for Artists

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2010-04-27 08:03:31

Mapping Me: A Landscape of Women's Stories Editors: Orchid Tierney and Tamara Azizian We are seeking submissions in any artistic format (photography, painting, sketching etc) from indigenous women for a new anthology project titled, "Mapping Me, a Landscape of Women's Stories." By...» Read More

 

Australian Aboriginal Art and the contemporary gallery

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2010-03-20 14:00:25

Colin Laverty speaks on Beyond Sacred - Australian Aboriginal art and why it belongs in contemporary galleries + institutions and not ethnographic + anthropological museums. Colin and Elizabeth Laverty began collecting Aboriginal art twenty years ago, and their collection has been...» Read More

 

WINNERS ANNOUNCED FOR 2009 VICTORIAN INDIGENOUS ART AWARDS

WINNERS ANNOUNCED FOR 2009 VICTORIAN INDIGENOUS ART AWARDS

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2009-12-02 21:57:56

The Wathaurung woman and Melbourne-based artist, Bindi Cole has been awarded the $25,000 Deadly Art Award for her evocative photograph, Ajay. Bindi Cole is an emerging artist and photographer whose work reveals uncomfortable truths about the fundamental disconnection between...» Read More

 

ART Sense launches in Cairns

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2009-11-14 20:33:13

A new Aboriginal art sales service and community development organisation has been founded in Cairns, with a second office set to open in Alice Springs. General Manager Tim Cram said four years of development had gone into the ARTSense business model,...» Read More

 

Aboriginal art-inspired Wicked Campers (thanks to Music Outback Foundation)

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2009-11-14 15:17:53

The Music Outback Foundation uses music and arts based programs to help improve education outcomes on remote Indigenous communities. Their annual event Mobfest Tanami is a...» Read More

 

REFLECTIONS ON THE WESTERN AUSTRALIAN INDIGENOUS ART AWARD

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2009-09-01 07:01:07

From Will Owen: Having stayed at home this year, I don't have much of substance to say about the 26th National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Awards that hasn't already been said elsewhere. I've never been terribly fond of winner...» Read More

 

Australian Code to Regulate Aboriginal Art Trade

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2009-08-28 06:54:36

Australia’s Aboriginal art business will have to follow minimum standards for dealers, agents, and artists, under a wide-ranging code of conduct that’s been recently updated and awaits the signature of the federal arts minister. Intended to crack down on unscrupulous operators,...» Read More

 

Outback art code draws line in the sand

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2009-08-22 08:21:36

Art dealers will be able to pay artists with alcohol or secondhand vehicles but will be forced to declare their agreed value under a wide-ranging code of conduct for the Aboriginal art business. The final copy of the code, obtained by...» Read More

 

The most eye-opening show of Aboriginal art ever

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2009-08-04 06:02:30

Here goes: This is finest show of Aboriginal art I have ever seen. It is neither the biggest (only 20 barks, and some objects), nor the most varied (it is narrow in range), but the works are unique in historical and...» Read More

 

Aboriginal arts talk

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2009-03-31 07:34:01

An update from Will Owen: No essay this week, I confess, as I've happily spent the last seven days entertaining my friend Walter, down from Boston for a springtime visit, our first since we saw each other at the opening of...» Read More

 

House of Koorang Gallery Opens

House of Koorang Gallery Opens

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2009-03-15 16:05:37

on the 14th March the new House of Koorang Gallery Opened in Nowra NSW. This is the first retail gallery store for Mundara and Novy after running an Indigenous wholesale for over 12 years. The House of Koorang Gallery has...» Read More

 

KALKADUNGA MAN ON THE ROAD

KALKADUNGA MAN ON THE ROAD

Posted by Jeremy Eccles | 2009-03-12 15:47:50

Australia's finest and most imaginative vocal ensemble – The Song Company - has pushed the envelope yet again, into the indigenous. And typically of this now-25 year old group, lead by the irrepressible Roland Peelman, it's an enveloping experience they...» Read More

 

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art program opens

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2009-02-26 07:16:31

Marrickville Council is encouraging Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists to apply for its Marrickville Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Arts Studio Program, which promotes the ongoing growth of arts and culture. “Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities contribute greatly to...» Read More

 

Desert masters claim place in history

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2008-10-21 20:16:07

Vivien Johnson's emotive book launch as reported by Nicolas Rothwell for The Australian: IT was almost four decades ago, in this harsh desert country, that the Aboriginal painting movement was born. Now, after many tribulations and triumphs, the definitive history...» Read More

 

Chemically Coded Paintings

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2008-10-01 12:17:05

An interesting blog entry on copyright and a new technology using chemical forumlas to identify originals: A few years ago I was invited to attend a launch at the Australia Council of the then new Indigenous Protocols booklets for media arts,...» Read More

 

Aboriginal Art Workshop - Buckingham

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2008-08-28 17:48:52

VISITORS to Buckingham's Maids Moreton Avenue experienced aboriginal culture when people were invited to make journey sticks at a recent workshop. The Buckingham Community Wildlife Project invited people to take a walk along the avenue and then decorate a stick with...» Read More

 

Capability Statements from service providers

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2007-12-14 08:24:57

The Association of Northern, Kimberley and Arnhem Aboriginal Artists (ANKAAA) is seeking capability statements/CVs from suitably qualified individuals and organisations that are interested in delivering a range of arts and business training and development activities to artists and arts workers...» Read More

 

The Collector KAREL KUPKA IN NORTH AUSTRALIA

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2007-10-26 08:19:54

n late June 1956, towards midday, after a swift flight through dry-season skies, the Czech artist Karel Kupka clambered from a prop plane at Milingimbi airstrip and stepped for the first time into the elusive world of Arnhem Land. This arrival,...» Read More

 

The New McCulloch Encyclopedia of Australian Art

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2006-11-23 04:06:01

The Age reviews The New McCulloch's Encyclopedia of Australian Art and examines the difference between The Encyclopedia of Australian Art and The New McCulloch's Encyclopedia of Australian Art: I have in front of me the third edition of The Encyclopedia of...» Read More

 

A bigger and better bible

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2006-10-27 03:17:47

Faults aside, the new McCulloch's Encyclopedia of Australian Art is a mammoth achievement and a must-have for art buffs, writes Sebastian Smee From the Australian: Alan McCulloch began compiling his Encyclopedia of Australian Art as a loose-leaf filing system in the 1940s,...» Read More

 

International Herald Tribune - From Aboriginal children, painful and poignant art

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 2005-08-20 07:51:37

International Herald Tribune From Aboriginal children, painful and poignant art Felicia R. Lee Saturday, August 20, 2005 Quoted from article: The pastel, titled "Down to Drink," depicts a terrain of enchantment - tangerine-colored hills, a moon in a dark blue sky, a tangle of trees,...» Read More

 

That Silly Old Woman

Posted by Aboriginal Art Directory | 1998-05-16 13:31:38

“The all-over picture relies on a surface knit of identical or closely similar elements which repeat themselves without marked variation from one edge to the other. It…dispenses apparently with beginning, middle and end…dissolving the pictorial into sheer texture, sheer sensation…seeming...» Read More