Indigenous Art

Hugo Michell Gallery Opening: Binygurr Wirrpanda + Min Wong
04
Sep

Hugo Michell Gallery Opening: Binygurr Wirrpanda + Min Wong

Please join us for the launch of Binygurr Wirrpanda’s ‘Dancing Brolgas’ and Min Wong’s ‘You can’t talk butterfly language to caterpillar people’ on Thursday 12th September from 6-8pm.
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Binygurr Wirrpanda
Dancing Brolgas
In the accompanying catalogue essay, Will Stubbs writes: “Each particular pattern carries the essence of an estate of land which is held in the hundreds of songs which are encoded in that design. These epic song cycles are a cross between poetry and the Latin Mass. They retell the movements of ancestral forces through the landscape.”
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Min Wong
You can’t talk butterfly language to caterpillar people
Birthed from a broken heart, this work examines the emerging principles of interpersonal neurobiology as an embodied and relational process to support compassion, kindness, resilience, and well-being in our personal lives, our relationships, and our communities.
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Hugo Michell Gallery are proud to partner with Bird in Hand Winery for this opening event.
Please join us in celebrating the launch of these two exhibitions!
Hugo Michell Gallery acknowledges the Kaurna people as the traditional custodians of the Adelaide region, and that their cultural and heritage beliefs are still as important to the living Kaurna people today.
Min Wong, I told you a lie, 2024, print on velvet, 110 x 80 cm
Hugo Michell Gallery Opening: Guruwuy Murrinyina, Garawan Waṉambi & Djirrirra Wunuŋmurra | David Booth [Ghostpatrol]
19
May

Hugo Michell Gallery Opening: Guruwuy Murrinyina, Garawan Waṉambi & Djirrirra Wunuŋmurra | David Booth [Ghostpatrol]

Hugo Michell Gallery invites you to the opening of ‘Dhulmu -Deep’, featuring work by Guruwuy Murrinyina, Garawan Waṉambi and Djirrirra Wunuŋmurra, and ‘Drawing Is Magic, and I Believe It!’ by David Booth [Ghostpatrol] on WEDNESDAY 24th May, 6-8pm.
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Guruwuy Murrinyina, Garawan Waṉambi and Djirrirra Wunuŋmurra
Dhulmu – Deep
The Buku-Larrŋgay Mulka Art Centre, located in the Aboriginal community of Yirrkala, is one of Australia’s premier Aboriginal art centres. The meaning of Buku-Larrŋgay in Yolŋu matha is “the feeling on your face as it is struck by the first rays of the sun”.
Hugo Michell Gallery are proud to present the incredible works by artists Guruwuy Murrinyina, Garawan Waṉambi and Djirrirra Wunuŋmurra, ranging from paintings on Stringybark to Larrakitj.
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David Booth [Ghostpatrol]
Drawing Is Magic, and I Believe It!
About the work, Booth shares: “Growing up I was lucky that the scrap drawing paper in my home was nice large never-ending sheets of dot matrix paper recycled from my dad’s work as a bridge engineer. Sometimes this paper had CAD plan drawings on it, and I remember spending a lot of time colouring, scribbling, and playing on that side of the page. There must have been something in those technical drawings that my brain liked.
The task I set for my drawings is to exist as a beacon or portal to help people feel optimistic and remember to access their own magical playground in their mind.
I have strong childhood memories of watching my dad on our holidays admiring massive dams or impressive bridges and observing him soak up all the detail and beauty of these drawings brought to life. My daydreamy child brain loved joining the dots between plan drawings and being dwarfed by the epic structures as we walked across my dad’s bridges. This is my foundation for believing that ‘Drawing is Magic’.
David Booth in the studio with works for 'Drawing Is Magic, and I Believe It!, 2023. Photography by Amber Fletcher
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Hugo Michell Gallery are proud to partner with Bird in Hand Winery for this opening event.
Please join us in celebrating the launch of these two exhibitions!
Hugo Michell Gallery acknowledges the Kaurna people as the traditional custodians of the Adelaide region, and that their cultural and heritage beliefs are still as important to the living Kaurna people today.
We also acknowledge the Yolŋu people whose land on which the works for this exhibition have been created, and recognise their continuing connection to land, waters and culture and pay respects to Elders past, present, and emerging.
Hugo Michell Gallery Open: Bulthirrirri Wunuŋmurra & Binygurr Wirrpanda | Amy Joy Watson
11
Mar

Hugo Michell Gallery Open: Bulthirrirri Wunuŋmurra & Binygurr Wirrpanda | Amy Joy Watson

Hugo Michell Gallery invites you to the opening of 'Yirrkala - Next Wave' by Bulthirrirri Wunuŋmurra & Binygurr Wirrpanda and 'Goodnight Air' by Amy Joy Watson on Saturday 5th November.
Artist Talks | Saturday 5th Nov, 1:30pm
Opening Event | Saturday 5th Nov, 2-4pm
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Bulthirrirri Wunuŋmurra & Binygurr Wirrpanda
Yirrkala - Next Wave
'Yirrkala - Next Wave' shines a light on two early career artists working out of Buku-Larrŋgay Mulka Indigenous Art Centre, Yirrkala. Striking a balance between continuity with their forebears’ artistic legacy and innovative artmaking, the exhibition showcases works by Bulthirrirri Wunuŋmurra & Binygurr Wirrpanda that speak to the concept of water as a metaphor and tool for discussing abstract concepts of existence in Yolŋu culture.
Tides, rain, springs, dew, mist, clouds are all drawn on to discuss these abstract concepts of existence. And so, this next wave of Yirrkala artists is breaking on the shore of mainstream awareness.
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Amy Joy Watson
Goodnight Air
In 'Goodnight Air' Amy Joy Watson builds on her distinctive visual language that explores geography, light and emotional states through delicate woven landscapes, made of metallic thread.
Across embroidered works on paper and tarnished brass mesh, this new body of work explores art making as a process for healing and recovery.
In the wake of post-natal anxiety and acute insomnia, Amy’s slow and gentle hand stitching process revealed itself as a form of active meditation, one that is vital to her mental health.
Shimmering golden threads represent the cascading water or “liquid sunshine” that manifests in visualisations that appear during moments of contemplation and meditation.
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Hugo Michell Gallery are proud to partner with Bird in Hand Winery for this opening event.
Please join us in celebrating the launch of these two exhibitions!
Hugo Michell Gallery acknowledges the Kaurna people as the traditional custodians of the Adelaide region, and that their cultural and heritage beliefs are still as important to the living Kaurna people today.

BINYGURR WIRRPANDA, Binygurr Wirrpanda, Mäna at Lutumba (972-22), 2022, etching and earth pigments on found metal sign, 92 x 126 cm

Amy Joy Watson, Untitled (detail), 2022, metallic thread, brass mesh and brass frame, 114 x 92 cm

Garawan Wanambi Joins Hugo Michell Gallery as a Represented Artist
25
Feb

Garawan Wanambi Joins Hugo Michell Gallery as a Represented Artist

Hugo Michell Gallery welcomes the addition of Garawan Wanambi to our represented artists!

Born in 1965, Garawan Wanambi belongs to Marrakulu clan and works out of the Buku-Larrnggay Mulka Centre in Northern Arhem Land.

After his father’s death in 1973, Garawan was brought up by Wayuŋga Wanambi of the Marraŋu clan. Through this connection, Garawan paints Marraŋu designs, the counterpart of Marrakulu from the other side of Arnhem Bay. Garawan and his family continue to live and work at Gängan, to the south of Yirrkala, and he has emerged as one of the most gifted of the new generation of artists based there.

Garawan extends the history and practice of Yolŋu painting. Whilst continuing to use natural pigments and miny’tji (sacred clan designs), he extends the possibilities of these methods through the mixing of natural pigments to form unique colours and deliberate tonal variations. His precise geometry and complex layering of designs create a depth of field on an otherwise flattened surface and a mesmerising optical effect. In doing this, Wanambi explores the Yolŋu concept of Buwayak ‒ simultaneously making elements both visible and invisible.

He was a finalist in the Telstra Art Prize in 2009, 2014, 2020, and a finalist in the Kate Challis RAKA Award in 2013. In 2014 he was awarded the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Award Best Bark painting prize.

Garawan has works held in a number of significant collections; Kerry Stokes Larrakitj Collection, The Kluge-Ruhe Aboriginal Art Collection (USA), Art Gallery of New South Wales, Charles Darwin University Art Collection, Artbank, Art Gallery of South Australia, National Museum of Australia, Monash University Art Museum Collection. His works are also held in private collection both nationally and internationally.