EMILY KAME KNGWARREYE

1910-1996

Born c.1910 Alhalkere (Soakage Bore) Utopia Station. Emily was an Eastern Anmatyerre speaker and senor artist at Utopia. Her country was Allhalkere and her Dreamings included Sand Goanna, Wild Orange, and Emu.

Emily first met white people as a young girl aged about nine. She worked in her younger days as a stock hand on pastoral properties in the area at a time when Aboriginal women on the stations were usually employed as domestics suggesting the forceful independence of her personality.

Emily was the adopted daughter of Jacob Jones, a very important lawman in the Alyawarre community, and was a leader in the women's ceremonial business at Utopia.

From the time she painted her first canvas for 'A Summer Project 1988-9', the work of Emily Kame Kngwarreye received widespread acclaim and recognition. Emily found in acrylics and canvas a medium more suited to the bold immediacy of her style than the more laborious process of batik, in which she had been working for the preceding decade and exhibiting with the Utopia women in exhibitions in Australia and abroad since 1977.

Her techniques were highly individual which saw under-drawings covered by layers of dots. Her pleasure in working as an artist was reflected in her powerful colours and her energetic and expressive compositions.

In 1990 Emily's work was shown in two highly successful solo shows in Sydney, as well as the Art Gallery of NSW's 'Abstraction' show. Later that year she participated in the CAAMA/ Utopia artists-in-residence program at the ICA, Perth. Holmes `a Court Foundation, Perth, 1990) Several more solo shows have followed: Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi, Melbourne (1990, 1991) Aboriginal Desert Art Gallery Melbourne (1994, 1995, 1997.)

"MY COUNTRY"

EMILY KAME KNGWARREYE

Emily’s work was rapidly acquired by major public Galleries and private collectors in Australia and overseas.

Emily Kame Kngwarreye has been included in over 48 group exhibitions around Australia and the world, including;

Ireland - 'A Picture Story', Royal Hibernian Gallery, Dublin ;

Russia - 'Aboriginal Paintings From The Desert', Union Gallery, Moscow, 1991 and touring St Petersburg, Ukraine, Minsk Byelorussia, Riga Latvia;

USA Aboriginal Art', Harvard University and touring USA and Australia;

Japan - 'Aboriginal Art From Australia', National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo, 1992 and 'Crossroads Towards a New Reality', National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto and Tokyo etc.

She is the most applauded painter of the Utopia Movement to date, and one of the best known of the desert artists, painting with an undiminished energy which belied her years.

In 1992 she was awarded an Australian Arts Creative Fellowship. In 1993 she exhibited in the Joan and Peter Clemenger Triennial Exhibition of Contemporary Australian Art at the National Gallery of Victoria and featured in 'Aratjara' - Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art touring Dusseldorf, London and other European Galleries.

On the 3 rd September 1996 Emily Kame Kngwarreye passed away, she will be remembered for her innovation and success within the Australian contemporary art movement.

Collections:

Holmes ŕ Court,

Michael Hollow Collection

National Gallery of Australia,

Canberra, Art Gallery of NSW,

Art Gallery of Western Australia, National Gallery of Victoria,

Queensland Art Gallery,

Benalla Regional Art Gallery,

Araluen Arts Centre, Alice Springs,

Auckland City Arts Gallery,

New Zealand, Artbank.

Carnegie, ATSIC etc .