Desert Country

Editorial

Image
Tjungkara KEN, Australia, 1969, Pitjantjatjara people, South Australia
Ngayuku ngura - My country, 2010, Amata, South Australia, synthetic polymer paint on linen
152.5 x 101.5 cm, d'Auvergne Boxall Bequest Fund 2010, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide
© Tjungkara Ken, Courtesy of Tjala Arts

The desert painting movement - described as "the greatest gift Australia has made to world art since white settlement" - is Australia's most influential and important artistic movement. Desert Country, a touring collection from the Art Gallery of South Australia, is the first exhibition to chart the evolution of this internationally acclaimed art movement.

Embodying the lore and legends of the many Indigenous artists working in the desert regions of South Australia, Western Australia and the Northern Territory, the exhibition spans more than 40 years, and features many remarkable and beautiful works.

Highlights include the ground-breaking canvases of the Papunya Tula and Western Desert Mob, and powerful works by Pitjantjatjara artists, mapping the devastated lands that they were forced to vacate during the atomic bomb and rocket testing of the 1950s.

A ground-breaking, profound, and important exhibition.

Richard Watts, Citysearch