For the first time in its 99 year-history, the Archibald Prize has been won by an Indigenous painter. The Wynne and Sulman Prize winners also signal a time of change.
For non-Indigenous Australians, the last summer of bushfires seemed to mark the end times. Indigenous Australians have a long perspective on history, which offers hope.
Monuments are testaments to how a society wants to remember. Now is the time to ask which monuments can withstand introspection. Artists are opening those conversations – sometimes hilariously.
Vincent Namatjira, Western Arrernte people, Northern Territory, born 1983, Alice Springs, Northern Territory, Close Contact, 2018, Indulkana, South Australia, synthetic polymer paint on plywood; Gift of the James & Diana Ramsay Foundation for the Ramsay Art Prize 2019.
Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, photo: Grant Hancock
Though galleries have since closed their doors, this reviewer got to see Mavis Ngallametta's works in all their glory. Their birdseye view of Country provides a perspective we're missing right now.
Michael Nelson’s Tjakamarra’s Five Stories, which sold for A$687,877 at Sothebys in London in 2016.
SOTHEBY'S LONDON
Bringing together innovative and traditional works, the Linear exhibition gives us a new map for sharing land and knowledge.
The Quandamooka Art, Museum and Performance Institute offers a new way of considering the shape of First Nations museums in Australia.
Cox Architecture/QYAC
As musuems are forced to face their colonial past, could a radically re-imagined museum become a place for genuine exchange, reconciliation and restitution?
From Country to Culture:
Artist: Lisa Waup. Designer: Verner. Collection: Journeys.
Dylan Buckee
Most Indigenous art works are produced in around 90 Indigenous art centres located in very remote regions. But there are staff and management issues, which can be solved by better VET programs.
The Indigenous flag flies above Victorian Parliament in 2017.
Tracey Nearmy/AAP
As the flag's copyright owner, Luritja artist Harold Thomas has the right to grant licences to whomever he pleases. Asking the government to buy back his copyright licence could be seen as an appropriation of Aboriginal property rights.
Detail from Fiona Foley Native Blood Type C photograph x cm Edition copy.
Fiona Foley
Art historians argue that the life of the artist should be viewed independently of their art but, for most Aboriginal artists, art is a cultural expression that encompasses their lives.
Miranda Tapsell in Top End Wedding, a new Australian film about identity and belonging, directed by Wayne Blair (The Sapphires).
Courtesy of Universal Pictures
Romantic comedy meets road movie in Wayne Blair's much anticipated new film.
An illustration of Palorchestes azael, a marsupial tapir from the Pleistocene of Australia. There is evidence that this extinct species is depicted in rock art from the Kimberley.
Nobu Tamura/Wikimedia Commons
Indigenous artists and arts centres from the Kimberley region were invited to help curate this new exhibition, presented as part of the Perth Festival 2019.
Kathleen Petyarre looking across Atnangker country, Northern Territory, December 2000.
Photograph Ian North; courtesy Wakefield Press
Principal Fellow (Hon), Victorian College of the Arts, University of Melbourne. Editor in Chief, Design and Art of Australia Online, University of Melbourne
Lecturer, Creative Writing and Literary Studies, School of Media, Entertainment and Creative Arts, Creative Industries Faculty, Queensland University of Technology