PAPUNYA TULA : 50 YEARS EXHIBITION @ S.H.ERVIN GALLERY

Geoff Bardon
Mary Napangati – Untitled
Papunya Tula Artwork
Ronnie Tjampitjinpa – Untitled
Tjinkiya Napaltjarri – Untitled
Turkey Tolson Tjupurrula ‘Untitled’

Although Papunya Tula artists had been painting on country for decades, or perhaps centuries, it was only when metropolitan art gallery owners such as Geoff Bardon made a pilgrimage to the settlement of Papunya, two hundred and forty kilometres north west of Alice Springs, that the remarkable art movement was revealed.

Papunya Tula artists started a contemporary indigenous art movement across Australia. It motivated the formation of Arts Centres across the desert and supported urban indigenous artists as they began to explore new ideas and themes.

The early paintings were on board, and then there was a shift to linen. The emergence of the women artists in the 1990’s and the second generation emerging into the 21st century is ensuring that increasing international attention is having a profound effect on the Papunya artists renown.

The Papunya Tula painting style incorporates knowledge of traditional and sandpainting associated with ceremony. To portray these dreamtime creation stories for the public, has required the removal of sacred symbols and the careful monitoring of ancestral design.

The guest curator Christopher Hodges, artist and director of Utopia Art Sydney has compiled a comprehensive exhibition from leading private collections. Hodges is an authority on the Papunya Tula art having represented its artists in Sydney since 1988. 

This landmark survey exhibition, being held at the S.H.Ervin Gallery on Observatory Hill, features the work of over one hundred artists and is running till Sunday 4th April, 2021.

ww.shervingallery@nationaltrust.com.au

Featured image ; Clifford Possum Tjapaljarri – Ngarlu Love Story. All images by Ben Apfelbaum