Ulli Beier (1922-2011) I remember a Yoruba saying that Ulli often quoted: “If an old man dies, you shall not weep but congratulate his family for that his life has come full circle.”
As leaders of unique working partnerships between the Indigenous art industry and the Queensland Government, pioneers like Judy Watson, Dennis Nona, Vernon Ah Kee, Richard Bell and Sally Gabori have established strong international reputations.
'Yalangabara: Art of the Djang'kawu' curated by Banduk Marika and Margie West includes art made from 1939 till recently. All works are about the same creation story and all comprise a history of creative and spiritual custodianship by the Marika family of the Rirratjingu clan.
Fiona Foley's recent public work has gone from strength to strength most recently at Mackay where her six large new works form a trail commemorating the Pacific and black history of the region.
Newtown fellow at the University of Cambridge Khadija La visited AAMU (the Musuem of Contemporary Aboriginal Art) in Utrecht to see "Breaking with Tradition" an exhibition curated by Georges Petitjean that hangs works by CoBrA artists together with work by Indigenous artists and Roar artists who work or worked in Indigenous art centres.
Dutch art historian Marianne Riphagen, whose PhD looked at contemporary Indigenous photo-media artists, draws togther the dark and light in the artwork of Rembrandt and South Australia-based Darren Siwes to question the Dutch Golden Age.
Canopy Artspace first opened for the 2009 Cairns Art Fair. It houses the Australian Art Print Network, New Flames Foundation and Editions Tremblay NFP (no Fixed Press). Paloma Ramos who works at Editions Tremblay vividly decribes the intense and fertile work in printmaking and sculpture that happens at Canopy.
This is the first time that noted historian and writer on Aboriginal art Ian McLean has written a substantial interpretive artcile on the work of Trevor Nickolls. Nickolls began working in the 70s and is still painting his own particular brand of cross-cultural art.
Associate Lecturer at the College of Fine Art in Sydney Tess Allas writes about when she was NSW Regional Indigenous Cultural Officer and first met the women of Boggabilla who formed the Euraba Paper Company which won the Parliament of NSW Aboriginal Art Prize in 2010.
Still Life: The Food Bowl: Ken and Julia Yonetani Artereal Gallery, Sydney, June 2011 Mildura Palimpsest #8, 9-11 Sept 2011 GV Art, London, October 2011 Melting moments: Janet Tavener Incinerator Art Space, Willoughby 2 -27 March 2011