Image: Professor Fred Myer and curator Kelli Cole pictured at the NGA
Artworks L-R: Sandover Map, Cartography © Brenda Thornley 2023, Greg Weight ‘Emily Kam Kngwarray’ 1994, ink jet mural print
Photograph by Jennifer Green, writer and linguist
Photographer Greg Weight’s captivating portrait of the late artist Emily Kam Kngwarray is currently on display at the National Gallery of Australia as part of an extensive survey exhibition showcasing Kngwarray’s work.
Weight met Kngwarrey at Delmore Downs in February 1994 and took several images. As he recalled in Australian Artists: Portraits by Greg Weight: ‘I sat with the women from Utopia all afternoon while they talked and painted. I took photographs occasionally, trying not to be too intrusive yet always looking for a suitable angle.’
Emily Kam Kngwarray celebrates the timeless art of a pre-eminent Australian artist, one of the world’s most significant contemporary painters to emerge in the twentieth century. A senior Anmatyerr woman, Kngwarray devoted her final years to painting, creating works that encapsulate the experience and authority she gained throughout an extraordinary life.
The exhibition will be an extensive survey of Emily Kam Kngwarray’s work, bringing together paintings, textiles and works on paper drawn from international and national collections.
Curators: Kelli Cole, Warumungu and Luritja peoples, Curator, Special Projects, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Hetti Perkins, Arrernte and Kalkadoon peoples, Senior Curator-at-Large, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art
Exhibition current and through to 28 April 2024
For further information and to book tickets, visit the NGA website here