Red Cross Bushfire Appeal Raffle to be held at McCulloch's exhibition [11.02.2009]

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.