Alcaston Gallery

Shirley Macnamara

Australia

D.O.B: 01/01/1949

Shirley Macnamara draws upon her connection to her mother’s traditional Indjalandji Dhidhanu Country at Camooweal, Queensland and her father’s Country at Lake Nash, Alyawarr, Northern Territory.

One of Australia’s most significant contemporary sculptors, Macnamara creates poetic objects of immense beauty and poignancy. Weaving spinifex with ochres and other natural materials from her ancestral Country and her 45,000-hectare cattle station, she forms objects and sculptures that evoke the landscapes from which they were formed. The natural features of the land wield a powerful aesthetic and cultural influence on the design of her work.

Macnamara is a multiple award finalist and regular institutional exhibitor, and was awarded the Wandjuk Marika 3D Memorial Award at the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Awards (2017). In 2019 she was honoured with a major retrospective exhibition at Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art.