Art gathered by art writers Emily and Susan McCulloch on their research trips over almost two decades to Australia's remote art producing regions including the Western Desert, Arnhem Land & the Top End, Queensland, the Kimberley, NPY and PY lands.
Paintings, prints, beads, cushions, scarves, baskets, sculptures, books, ceramics and other indigenous objets d'art from the quirky to the collectible.
Artists include Ningura Napurrula, Ronnie Tjampitjinpa, Kitty Kantilla, Rosella Namok, Lily Karedada, Marcia Purdie, Angalyia Mitchell, Tatali Napurrula, Nyarrapyi Giles, Patrick Freddy Puruntatameri, Katjarra Butler, Yuyuya Nampitjinpa, Raymond Bush, Yananymul Mununggurr and Rover Thomas.
Free talk: Exploring the outback– an introduction to Aboriginal art
Saturday, February 21 7.30 pm
All welcome
RSVP opening and talk by February 14
M.0419896 473
E.rsvp@mccullochandmcculloch.com.au
All works for sale
Note: 5% of all sales donated to the national indigenous literacy programme World Without Books
www.worldwithoutbooks.org and proceeds from Sammy Clarmont print raffle will go to the Red Cross Bushfire Appeal.
We are donating the Sammy Clarmont work from our upcoming exhibition to the Red Cross Bushfire Appeal, so come along to our exhibition next week in Flinders (Thursday night until Monday) to purchase raffle tickets to win this stunning print from Lockhart River worth $800 and support the bushfire appeal.
Sammy Clarmont, Untitled (Red Earth), 1998, screenprint, edition 15/20, 56 x 76 cm. Purchased Old Parliament House, Canberra, 1997. $800 (framed).
Sammy Clarmont was born on the 25th of September 1972. He belongs to the Lama Lama language group, and is based at Lockhart River, Queensland. A painter and printmaker, his works reflects his connection to country, as he says: ‘my works are about my country and the animals and stories. My art works are contemporary but reflect the traditional culture and isolation of my Community.’ (Lockhart River Art Centre website).
About the work:
This print appears on page 19 of the book Our Way: Contemporary Aboriginal Art from Lockhart River, University of Queensland Press, 2007 by Sally Butler. Of it, Butler writes:
‘One of the more innovative landscapes created during the early printmaking years of contemporary Lockhart River art is Sammy Clarmont’s screenprint Untitled (Red Earth). This work has an aerial perspective of country similar to Central Desert acrylic painting, showing bird tracks and mapping lines across the earth. However, Clarmont’s screenprint approach creates an effect of space not achieved in desert paintings, particles of earth seeming to lift and float across the surface. This floating aspect diminishes the mapping effect of the images and translates more into a sense of experiencing the red earth – touching and smelling it as well as seeing it. In Clarmont’s landscape the very substance of country translates as a substance of life. Reference to red earth in Clarmont’s artwork recalls the geological diversity of the region...the inland areas are rich with mineral deposits that give the earth spectacular colouring.’
Susan McCulloch first met the Lockhart River Art Gang founding member Rosella Namok as a shy teenager on her first big trip outside of Lockhart River in FNQ around 1997 in Canberra. She and her fellow teenagers had come down to the National Heritage Awards in Canberra with their wonderful arts advisors Geoff and Fran Barker. They’d only just started printmaking and decided that they’d make a trip to an important award to show their work to some prominent art people to get some feedback. And feedback they got! They found a spot in the foyer of the building of Old Parliament House where the awards where held and spread their work out. Visitors such as the then NGA gallery director Betty Churcher, National Museum curator Margo Neale, me and others crowded around, knocked out by the freshness of their work and impressed with this shy young group who’d made such a big trip to show it.
Rosie was about 17 and hardly said a word! She sat there shyly as we all praised her and other’s work. Margo bought some instantly for the Queensland Art Gallery, of which she was indigenous curator at the time. I missed out that time but bought this Sammy Clarmont work Untitled (Red Earth), also in this exhibition, and bought a Namok some years later when visiting Lockhart staying with the Barkers to experience the environment of Lockhart and spend more time with Rose (by that time a very hot young art star) and the others in their country. An unforgettable experience.
'I'd call this the best 50 dollars worth available in art publishing' says Annabel Frost in her review of McCulloch's Contemporary Aboriginal Art in the February 2009 edition of Country Style magazine.
And the February 2009 edition of the Victorian Writers' Centre magazine, Victorian Writer, has an interview with McCulloch & McCulloch.
Benjamin Law has a great piece on McCulloch & McCulloch in the latest copy of Frankie magazine, for an article on 'creative ladies who work with their mums'.
"What I find attractive about Susan McCulloch's treatment of Aboriginal art is the manner in which she combines a first-hand experience of Aboriginal art with a journalistic flare and a market-savvy approach...one cannot but respect McCulloch's profound first-hand knowledge."
"Some books reflect the art market," he continues, "this one will do much to mould the indigenous art market over the next few years, serving the roles of a well-informed introduction as well as a promotional guide to those wishing to collect indigenous art."
SCOOP WA Insite magazine also features a review of the new 'neatly presented guide', noting that 'books like this are so important at bridging cross-cultural barriers.'
Louise Martin-Chew has a wonderfully written review of McCulloch & McCulloch in the latest issue of Art World magazine, where she calls us 'a rare thing in Australia – a dynasty involved in art publishing' and speaks fondly of our 'highly pictorial and breezily informative' Encyclopedia as her 'best friend' that she has always kept close by.
She describes McCulloch's Contemporary Aboriginal Art as a 'triumph in clarity, with maps, styles and artists outlined area by area, community by community' and says of our titles that they display a 'lively intelligence and art-market savvy.'
Kieran Finnane interviewed us for the Alice Springs News, we were included in Gabriella Coslovich's article on Desert Mob for The Age, and we went on Richard Watt's Smart Arts program on 3RRR, this time together.
Susan has appeared on ABC Radio in Perth and Hobart and 3MBS.
Our Aboriginal art books have also been mentioned in an article in the new magazine Canvas, and on the ABC Artworks program.
But probably the loveliest article has come from a Mornington Peninsula local, Fran Henke, who wrote a piece for the Hastings Independent on the Melbourne launch (below).
The exhibition features important works by Freddie Timms, Jimmy Nerrimah, Kathleen Petyarre, Rover Thomas, Walangkura Napanangka, Jock Mosquito and exciting works by emerging artists Helen S Tiernan, Joanne Currie and Lloyd Kwilla.
