WATCH | Indigenous Art Centre Program (IACP): Artist Portrait Series

Through the committed work of the 2022 Indigenous Art Centre Program, Melbourne Art Fair and Agency Projects spotlight the five artists whose work was presented within the inaugural program, exploring the mechanisms of their practice, the stories they seek to tell, and the symbolism intertwined throughout their work. Discover the practice of Wanapati Yunupiŋu, Tolarno Galleries & Buku-Larrŋgay Mulka; Ben Ward, Waringarri Aboriginal Arts; Helen Ganalmirriwuy, Milingimbi Art and Culture; Jonathon Bush, Jilimara Arts & Crafts Association; and Patsy Mudgedell, Warlayirti Artists.

Wanapati Yunupiŋu
Buku-Larrngay Mulka
Tolarno Galleries 

Across contemporary art practice, the parameters of painting have been pushed against to expand the practice through experimentation, interpretation, and innovation. The work of Wanapati Yunupiŋu is a superior example of this creation of new frontiers in the medium. Yunupiŋu paintings are multilayered, mapping intergenerational knowledge of fire and water and the way these elements are understood and used together. Hidden within the metal geographies of his work, animals of land and sea move across their landscape.
Filmed on the land of Biranybirany.

Ben Ward
Waringarri Aboriginal Arts

Ben Ward’s work feels like a kind of intimate portraiture of Country, viewed as if through a kaleidoscope with geometric fractals telling of a vast landscape. When Ben Ward speaks of Country and creates work in its image, he speaks of tradition born from the land, that the land belongs to all, and that all we need will be provided for. Ben Ward’s view of the land is of something infinite, something in motion. Though his work is angular and shapely, there is never a sense of stillness but a feeling of movement, as if the canvas was breathing, just as the land does.
Filmed on the land of Miriwoong Country.

Helen Ganalmirriwuy
Milingimbi Art and Culture

Helen Ganalmirriwuy’s work is, in many ways, language. Colours and form are representative of self, of lineage, of ritual. In each of Helen’s mindirr – woven objects – members of her family and their traditions are told, their stories communicated through the steady dialect of skill. The colours in Helen’s practice have great significance. These works are created through methods of dying – both traditional and contemporary – with materials sourced from the land. Each hue woven into the mindirr has a purpose: they represent the clans of Helen’s ancestors, the traditional rituals of Helen’s people, and Helen herself.
Filmed on the land of Rapuma Island, Gorryindi Country.

Jonathon Bush
Jilamara Arts & Crafts Association

Johnathon’s ochre paintings present a unique combination of Tiwi culture and his personal views on global politics, family and cultural heritage. He adopts some painting techniques that reflect jilamara (Tiwi body paint design) and combines them with representations of political figureheads, Catholic imagery that relates to the colonial experience of the Tiwi, stories of colonial crimes against Indigenous people or adaptations of old anthropological images of First Australians.

Patsy Mudgedell
Warlayirti Artists

Patsy Mudgedell’s work is an exercise in connection; the stories told through her work are meant for everyone. Patsy is deliberate in the way she holds space for people to experience their own narrative within her paintings, to create a universality through a strikingly contemporary style. Appealing to the human desire to share in empathy through commonality of experience–such as love, connection to storylines, relationship to land–Patsy’s work is an open invitation for people to experience our common humanity.
Filmed on the land of Ngururrpa native title land and Wirrimanu (Balgo), Western Australia.