Art exhibitions honour NAIDOC
GROUP and dual exhibitions celebrate a national event and a different approach to shared interests in three rewarding and informative local presentations.
NAIDOC Week, observed from the first Sunday in July until the second Sunday in July, celebrates the achievements, culture, and history of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
This year’s theme, “Because of Her, We Can” honours the role of women as advocates of justice, equal rights, and education.
Through songlines and Dreamtime stories Elders, mothers, esteemed Aunties, sisters and daughters have nurtured the art, languages, and music of the oldest continuing culture on planet Earth.
Two exhibitions, both of which continue until August, have works by local as well as nationally and internationally renowned artists.
The Toowoomba Regional Art Gallery is showing “Storytelling: Celebrating Indigenous Artists,” an exhibition drawn from its City collection.
The measured exhibition design invites a seamless transition from traditional artworks of detailed pattern and historical symbolism to boldly emphatic pieces that allude to popular culture as well as political innuendo.
The precise dots in a work by John Weeronga Bartoo find resonance with the ropes of beads in the Christian Thompson portrait.
Jenny Watson’s etchings are a fine foil to the watercolour landscapes by members of the Namatjira family.
Gordon Bennett’s reference to the artist Basquiat, and characters such as Darth Vader who appears in the dramatic linocut by Brian Robinson make fascinating visual leaps to the Toowoomba paintings by Vincent Serico.
St Vincent’s Hospital, Entrance 2, Scott St is holding its annual NAIDOC exhibition featuring works by Queensland artists.
From the feathered dream catchers by Gary Hopkins to the detail in the paintings by David McCarthy, and the eternal feminine depicted by Marianne Wobcke, there is a linear thread that links heart-felt concepts to familiar imagery.
Deena Dodd’s glowing auras carry messages of encouragement. Shape and pattern enhance the imagery of William Haupt, and colour, collage, and stylized figures give impact to work by Jane Jackson.
For Diane Sollitt there is a sense of identity and resilience established through family ties and life experiences.
The Feather and Lawry Gallery, 4 Russell St, is hosting Showcase Two highlighting work by painter Nikki Malone and fine art photographer Wendy Roche.
Landscapes and cityscapes vie for attention with flamboyant and mystical flower studies.
Malone’s flowers are bold, vibrant painterly statements, more portraits than floral impressions. Drapery suggestions and table top surfaces locate the compositions centrally on the picture plane allowing only a very formal interplay of negative and positive space.
Roche’s photographs capture flurries of memory, softly focussed blooms have a sensuous ambiguity, full blown and blowsy they rest like tired courtesans against diffused and dreamy backgrounds.
The cityscapes become grids of architecture: vortexes and caverns in which vehicles hurtle with hectic and manic intensity.