Two contemporary and divergent approaches to storytelling were judged as this year’s winners of the Fremantle Print Award. Formally known as the Shell Fremantle Print Award, the exhibition is on view from 9 September to 22 October.
The Award attracted a near record of 338 entries, with every state and territory represented in the final exhibition of 63 works. Each year the Award must reflect the most inventive and best in contemporary printmaking, without constraint. The 2006 judges Jenepher Duncan, Curator, Contemporary Art, Art Gallery of Western Australia; Dennis Nona, artist; and Jasmin Stephens, Exhibitions Manager (Acting), Fremantle Arts Centre, were chosen for their national profiles and particular knowledge of contemporary and Indigenous art. Judge Jenepher Duncan revealed the winners were immediate stand-outs.
This year’s $7000 acquisitive prize was awarded to distinguished printmaker, originally from Victoria artist Neil Emmerson, for his screenprint wood nymph triptych (the heart is a lonely hunter). Judge Jasmin Stephens says Emmerson’s “is a highly accomplished work, which effects a transference of feeling between the artist, the outsider figure portrayed and the viewer.” The wood nymphs derive from Emmerson’s investigations into men in camouflage and night photography in warfare.
The $3000 non-acquisitive prize was awarded to Torres StraitIsland artist Billy Missi for his entry Links. Missi’s work portrays a very significant story which he was told by his grand uncles and uncles on MoaIsland from a young age. Judge Dennis Nona explains Missi’s linoprint “conveys the essential role of trading between the Torres StraitIslands and Papua New Guinea with the Aboriginal people of Cape York.”
For more information, images or to arrange an interview:
A rare collection of limited edition prints and fabrics
Experience the culture of Australia’s Torres StraitIslands in an exhibition of intricately carved designs using printmaking techniques.This rare collection of works features nationally acclaimed artists, Alick Tipoti, Billy Missi David Bosun, Solomon Booth and Rosie Barkus
Featuring for a limited time only at the Firestation Gallery.All works for sale
Runs:
Thursday 7 September to
Sunday 24 September 2006
FIRESTATION GALLERY –
Firestation Print Studio
2 Willis Street
Armadale, VIC 3143
Gallery Hours:
Wed – Sun 11am – 5pm
For all enquiries please call Michelle on 0412-923-049
Art workshops to remote islands of the Torres Strait are being delivered during the month of July.Both YorkeIsland and Kubin Community Councils are hosting two week intensive courses delivered to ten budding Indigenous artists from each island.
Workshops hope to create a new platform for artists to access related training and materials for the development of the regions arts and culture.
With a surge of talented artists gaining global attention, artists from the Torres Strait are keen to develop their unique styles which have a fusion of western, Melanesian and Torres Strait cultural influences.
Like many remote areas, the region provides limited access to island based art packages and gallery opportunities, however many culturally rich objects and pieces are created and enjoyed for local festivities and ceremonies.Drawing on traditions and handed down stories, Islanders are extremely inventive in their use of locally sourced, natural materials.
The project is an initiative by Scott Elphinstone of the Indigenous Torres Strait Islander Art network (www.itsia.com) and has the full support of the individual participating councils and the Indigenous Regional Development Fund (IRADF).
Mr Elphinstone said, ‘It’s inspiring to see the joy amongst the community as new mediums are explored to tell their cultural stories.’
The workshops commenced June 25 and will conclude July 21 and are providing the opportunity for Torres Strait artists to express local indigenous identity, heritage and culture for the wider Australian community.Participants of YorkeIsland will learn methods in various printing mediums, namely screen-printing; artists from Kubin are engaging in painting techniques.Each intensive workshop program culminates in a public celebration and the unveiling of the new artworks.
A brief artist biography can be found for a selection of the participating artists at www.itsia.com
Images available on request Relations with the press
Rarely seen indigenous art from Far North Queensland will soon gain a global audience with the web launch of www.itsia.com, an online gallery and artists network showcasing the very best of Torres Strait art.
ITSIA has been made possible through a partnership between Scott Elphinstone and Michelle Bell who lived in the region for two years, working closely with Torres Strait artists at the Gab Titui Cultural Centre and the Far North Queensland Tropical TAFE.This time immersed in island culture sparked the beginning of enduring friendships which today has become the catalyst for the first exclusively Torres Strait artists online portal.
Mr Elphinstone believes it is important that dialogue is created to raise the profile of the regions indigenous art movement.‘The works have a captivating quality that we intend on sharing with the nation and in doing so; inspire new opportunities to secure a position for Torres Strait artists in the marketplace’.
The site showcases the diverse scope of fresh faces emerging into the indigenous arts scene.Artists draw on inherent skills and traditional knowledge, resulting in their own distinct contemporary styles that bring to life the spirit and culture of the region.
Torres Strait artist, Dennis Nona’s works currently opened to an international audience of over 400 at the Australian embassy in Paris.His works, along with other award winning artists such as Rosie Barkus, Billy Missi and Alick Tipoti are present in major Australian institutions including the National Gallery of Australia and NationalMuseum of Australia as well as international galleries such as the Tate in London.
ITSIA also focuses on providing professional development opportunities for it’s network members.The first of ITSIA’s projects rolled out in June as part of the highly successful Dreaming Festival’s visual art program.
The launch of the website provides a dedicated resource for Torres Strait artists to reach the Australian and International art scene.
MoaIsland’s Kubin Community officially opened its new Art Centre, which will contribute to the enhancement of local economic and social activity, and the promotion and preservation of Torres Strait Islander culture.
TSRA Chairperson Mr Toshie Kris said the TSRA was pleased to joint fund the $300,000 Mualgau Minaral Artist Collective’s Arts Centre, contributing $250,000 while the Queensland Department of State Development and Innovation assisting with $50,000.
“The TSRA was pleased to provide assistance to Kubin Council and the Mualgau Minaral Artist Collective to upgrade and transform what was the old Islanders Board of Industry and Service (IBIS) building to this new, modern Art Centre,” Mr Kris said.
“This is another successfully completed project under the TSRA’s Community Economic Incentive Scheme (CEIS), which is assisting many of our communities to venture into income generating business enterprises.
“Through programs such as these, we are working towards creating economic opportunities for our people.
“This new Centre will be a hub of activity for Kubin, with artists sharing their knowledge and expertise, as well as generating supplementary income and enhancing the community’s economy.
“The TSRA recognises that art is an important part of our unique ailan (island) culture - it is through our paintings, dance and song that our ancestral stories and legends are maintained and passed on to our younger generation, and it is important that projects such as these are supported to assist in the preservation of our culture.
“Over the past few years, Australia and the rest of the world have begun to experience the rich and vibrant culture and art of the Torres Strait, with our own “home grown” artists now in demand and gaining national and international recognition.
“The Centre will provide an environment where local artists can further develop their exceptional talent and expand the Torres Strait’s unique product into the wider arts market.
“It is through collaboration from all levels of government, that we are seeing results such as this in the Torres Strait,” Mr Kris said.
Press Release courtesy of Torres Strait Regional Authority
Printmaker Dennis Nona is giving ancient cosmology a graphic form, writes Miriam Cosic
DENNIS Nona is 33, but he talks like a man many times his age. His conversation is peppered with references to "the old days", days he remembers with a sentiment more urgent than nostalgia.
He grew up on BaduIsland in Torres Strait, before electricity, before television, before any serious Western influences apart from the Christianity that missionaries had brought in the late 19th century.
His family spoke Kala Lagaw Ya, the language of the western islands. "At night we would sit around with our parents and they would tell us the traditional stories to put us to sleep," Nona says. "Sometimes, when there was traditional dancing on, we'd ask them what the dances were about. Those times were good. Life was normal."
Without telling his father, he enrolled at the CairnsTAFECollege. "The first year was tough because I was looking for my style and I got lost," he says. "I started drawing boats and typical island scenery, the sun coming up ... it was like the touristy things you might see down at the esplanade in Cairns."
Increasingly frustrated, he fell back on the old ways. He had always been told as a child that if he needed guidance he should seek it from his ancestors. One night at the hostel, before going to sleep, he called on them. They took their time answering, but when they did, a fortnight later, it so shook him he still remembers every detail.
"Towards the morning, I had a dream in which I saw these traditional patterns," he says. "They were moving along, like a curtain moves or the way sea waves travel, and it was so beautiful, my eyes were running everywhere." Strange figures entered his dream, human but with strangely pointed heads. At first he thought they were having fun, calling to one another, and he wanted to join them. Then a witch figure entered, whom he immediately recognised as Zurath Aw Dhogai from the stories he had been told, and he realised they were running from her. They would appear and disappear, and so would she, entering and disappearing from different angles. He wanted to call out to them and say, "She went that way!" "It was very weird," he says. "I thought, this is like a movie, like a black-and-white animation movie. And then I was taken to the ceremonial time, in the dream, and I saw a sacred ground. "I was sitting with somebody, a black figure, and there were drum noises coming towards us. And a light over us that was getting smaller. Then there was a lot of dancing around me ... and I woke up."
The experience has propelled his work ever since. Now one of Australia's leading printmakers, Nona makes intricately detailed, finely wrought pictures, dense with human and spirit beings, with fish and boats and representations of wind and water, all of them recording his vanishing culture.
Nona subsequently attended the Canberra School of Art and is now working on his masters in visual arts at the Queensland College of Art. But driving it all is his immersion in his ancient traditions. His father has given him a plot of land, right in the village, and he hopes one day to build a studio and art school on it.
He does worry, that - apart from the artefacts and oral traditions that Haddon collected 100 years ago - the knowledge and the stories of his people are being lost. The desire to preserve them is what urges him on so furiously.
The Minister for the Arts and Sport, Senator Rod Kemp, today announced the appointment of the Indigenous artist, Rosie Barkus to the Australia Council’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Arts Board (ATSIAB) for a three-year term.
‘I would like to thank Ms Barkus for agreeing to this appointment, which comes at a time when the Indigenous arts sector is becoming increasing important to Indigenous communities and the Australian art industry as a whole,’ Senator Kemp said.
‘Ms Barkus’ extensive experience will make her presence on the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Arts Board very valuable and productive,’ Senator Kemp said.
Rosie Barkus is a self-taught textile designer and printer and is based on Thursday Island in the Torres Strait. Her works, which are inspired by her culture, the maritime history of the Torres Strait and marine and island environment that surrounds her, have been exhibited extensively both nationally and internationally.
In 2001 she was winner of the prestigious national Jaguar New Australian Designers of the Future award. This award highlights the importance of good design and the calibre of Australian design by recognising outstanding young Australian designers.
Ms Barkus’ design ‘Sugu’, which means octopus, is currently featured on an Australia Post self-stamped envelope as part of the Torres Strait Collection of art and artefacts. ATSIAB supports the development and promotion of traditional arts practices, as well as the generation of new forms of cultural and artistic expression among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in urban and regional areas, across all art forms.
Ms Barkus is the first woman to represent the Torres Strait on ATSIAB. The board actively promotes the unique Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures as integral to Australia’s national identity.
The Australia Council is the Australian Government’s principal arts funding body. It encourages the creativity and development of Australian artists and aims to increase access by all Australians to arts and cultural activities.
The diverse scope of Queensland’s indigenous art is set to grace Woodford next month, 9-12 June 2006, when a group of talented young Queensland indigenous artists showcase their inspiring work as part of The Dreaming Festival’s visual arts program.
Artworks will feature as part of the ‘Lagau Gidthal’ exhibition (language for Island Stories). The exhibition will present recent work by indigenous artists from the western and eastern islands of the Torres Strait. Using inherent skills fused with contemporary methodology, artworks capture the essence of the region with traditional and modern-day themes.
Using the mediums of painting, lino cut, etching and stenciling, the exhibition will go on display alongside six other indigenous art exhibitions as part of the Dreaming Festival’s visual art program. Festival patrons will also have the opportunity to join the artists in a series of intimate sized workshops sharing stories, skills and culture through art.
Scott Elphinstone, director of the Indigenous Torres Strait Islander Art online gallery & artists network (ITSIA) said: "The exhibition promotes Queensland's dynamic indigenous arts and artists to the nation. Not only will the exhibition challenge perceptions of indigenous art and culture in Australia, it will deliver direct economic benefits to artists and their communities.”
The Dreaming Festival was launched last year in spectacular fashion as the nation’s inaugural international celebration of Indigenous Cultures. With national and overseas indigenous artists taking part this year, 2006 is set to lure even bigger.
’’Lagau Gidthal’ is being held at the Dreaming Festival in Woodford and will run from 9-12 June. The support of the project sponsors will enable gallery talks and workshop demonstrations by featured artists from the exhibition. For festival information visit: www.thedreamingfestival.com
The Sydney Myer Foundation, ITSIA, the Torres Strait Regional Authority, Qantaslink and the Dreaming Festival are supporting the project.
Sponsor: Torres Strait Regional Authority, Qantaslink Artists: David Bosun, Solomon Booth, Victor Motlop, Florence Ware, Thomas Ahwang, Aicey Zaro, Rosie Barkus and Stanley Laifoo
The Torres Strait’s Gab Titui Torres Strait Cultural Centre on Thursday Island has taken top honours in the category of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Tourism at the Queensland Tourism Awards 2005, held in Brisbane on 18 November.
In a media release issued by the Torres Strait Regional Authority, Indigenous Affairs Minister, Amanda Vanstone said “this highly contested award is a credit to the region’s art and craftspeople and Gab Titui Cultural Centre’s staff. The Centre provides a unique and personal experience of Torres Strait culture.”
“At the opening of the Centre just over a year ago, I said that Gab Titui was the jewel in the crown of the Australian Governments Federation Fund – receiving the award has confirmed that,” said Senator Vanstone.
“Congratulations to the Gab Titui Cultural Centre on this outstanding achievement, as well as the Torres Strait Regional Authority for their continued support, but most importantly, congratulations to the Torres Strait people.
TSRA Chairperson, Mr Toshie Kris said while the Gab Titui Cultural Centre was developed as a keeping place for Torres Strait history and culture it is performing an equally important role as a cultural hub and continues to support opportunities for Torres Strait people.
“Our people can be very proud of this award because it signifies an appreciation by the tourism industry that we are making a significant contribution to the protection and strengthening of our culture – it’s about maintaining and sharing our rich heritage with our people and the rest of the world.
The eagerly awaited and widely acclaimed mini-series Remote Area Nurse (RAN), premiered on SBS in January 2006. The mini-series was filmed entirely on Masig and is a six part series, costing $6 million.
Each one hour episode encapsulates the incomparable beauty of the region, and abundantly displays the outstanding talents of the many Torres Strait actors and actresses involved.
R.A.N. is a film tribute to the work of remote area nurses across Australia. Producer Penny Chapman, whose sister worked as a RAN on Masig commented ‘Doctors stitch and bandage and then walk away. Nurses stay. Especially remote area nurses, who deveote their lives twenty –four hours a day to the community they work in, and who front the crisis on their own. No wonder they’re the most respected people in our country.’
The all-star cast includes Susie Porter who plays the role of nurse Helen Tremain who returns to the tropical paradise of the Torres Strait to discover it isn't as she left it. This is the story of a talented and passionate woman and the people who love her but want her gone.
Heading the Torres Strait cast of actors is Charles Passi (pictured), who plays Russ Gaibui who is the all-powerful island chairman who rules both the island and his home with an iron fist. He is judgemental and self-serving, but also incredibly and undeniably
charismatic.
Aaron Fa'aoso plays the role of Eddie Gaibui, Russ and Ina's son. Jimi Gela is Solomon Gaibui, another of Russ and Ina's sons. Belford Lui (Mick Gaibui) is a direct descendent of Douglas Pitt , one of the first missionaries to the region.
The Torres Strait cast also includes Serai Zaro (Ina Gaibui), Norah Bagiri (Lucy), Gail Mabo (Judy). Dan Mosby (Mr Ted), Elsie Passi (Mrs Ted), Moses Kaddy (Doug Augustus), Santa Marina Rodgers (Mrs Augustus), Louisa Taylor (Myrtle), Merwez Whaleboat (Bernadette), Freddy Kebisu (Amos), and Gabriel Ingui (Tuuks).
Torres Strait Island singer/songwriter Seaman Dan was honoured today with the Australia Council for the Arts’ 2005 Red Ochre Award.
Established by the Australia Council for the Arts Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Arts Board in 1993, the $50,000 Red Ochre Award recognises and pays tribute to an Indigenous artist who has made an outstanding contribution to the development and recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander arts and culture, both nationally and internationally.
In a statement released by the Australia Council for the Arts, Seaman Dan has been described as a performer who blends traditional Torres Strait Islander and pearling songs with jazz, hula and blues. Seaman Dan has earned a national and international reputation as a captivating musician whose songs convey the salty, sun-drenched lifestyle of the Torres Strait.
Seventy-six-year-old Seaman Dan, who also goes by the title ‘Uncle’, is dedicated to sharing and maintaining Torres Strait Islander culture through music. He says that he hopes younger generations leave his performances saying, ‘That old fulla, he’s 76 years old and he’s still singing. If he can do it, we can do it also!’
Seaman Dan made his first recording only five years ago, after his manager Dr Karl Neuenfeldt urged him to commit his music to CD.
He has since performed in Japan, The Netherlands and throughout Australia, most notably at Tasmania’s 10 Days on the Island Festival (2004) and at the National Museum’s Tracking Kultja: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Cultural Festival(2001),where he presented a stunning introduction to Torres Strait Islander culture and left delighted audiences with a new-found respect and appreciation of life in the Torres Strait.
Distributed through Hot Records, Seaman Dan’s albums include Follow the Sun (2000), Steady, Steady (2002) and most recently Perfect Pearl (2004), which won an ARIA award for Best World Music Album in 2004 and made Seaman Dan the oldest ever ARIA recipient.
The Queensland Government will present, from 7 April to 7 June 2006, an unpublished monographic exhibition of the works of Australian artist Dennis Nona, shown for the first time in France at the Australian Embassy, Paris.
This exhibition is organized by the Queensland Government through the Queensland Indigenous Arts Marketing and Export Agency (QIAMEA), Department of State Development, Trade and Innovation, Brisbane, Australia, in partnership with The Australian Art Print Network, Sydney. The curatorship has been given to Stéphane Jacob, French specialist of Aboriginal art (Arts d’Australie•Stéphane Jacob, Paris).
The exhibition will present the recent work of this contemporary artist from one of the Indigenous communities of Australia, from Badu Island in the Torres Strait (north of the continent). The exhibition will be organised around fifty works in the print mediums of linocut, etching and lithography. Sculptural works in bronze will also be a featured highlight of the exhibition.
The work of Dennis Nona was justly qualified by the art critic Nicolas Rothwell, of the national newspaper “The Australian”, as “the most intriguing work from the Northern capital” *.
*in reference to the Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Award Darwin, 2005.
Applying the drawings learnt from the traditional mask sculptors of the Torres Straits and their Papua New Guinea neighbours, Dennis Nona makes his works true "epics" to which the repetition of ancestral patterns brings artistic unity. Using an important number of visual and symbolic views, Dennis Nona displays traditional themes as well as contemporary events.
Beyond its physical dimension, Dennis Nona also conceives his visual art work as a “defence and illustration” of the culture of his ancestral homelands. Elders refer to his complex patterns and daring figurative imagery, when they tell their stories to young people -- as part of today's extraordinary cultural revival.
Dennis Nona was born in 1973 on Badu, one of the tropical islands in the Torres Strait, lsituated between the northern point of Australia and Papua New Guinea. After learning traditional wood sculpture during his childhood, he studied art at Cairns TAFE (School of decorative arts) and later, specializing in engraving, obtained a diploma of Visual Arts at the Institute of Art of the National Australian University, Canberra. He is currently undertaking a Master of Arts degree in Visual Arts at Griffith University, Brisbane.
His chosen techniques are linocut prints and etchings as the texture of the paper, the manufacture procedures as well as the inks and pigments used, seem to give more power to his oeuvre. From engraving-to-engraving unfolds a “film” -- more often in black and white though sometimes “coloured” -- into which a spectator can easily enter.
Considered one of the best representatives of Australian printmaking, Dennis Nona has influenced other emerging artists of his community. His works are present in most of the major Australian museums including the Queensland Art Gallery and the National Gallery of Australia as well as international galleries such as the Tate in London. They are regularly selected at the Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Award. His prints notably were part of the benchmark exhibition “Islands in the Sun: Prints by Indigenous Artists of the Oceanic Region” at the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra in 2001.
This exhibition is part of the Queensland Government’s international promotion of Indigenous artists from that state. Ms Penelope Wensley AO, Australian Ambassador to France, declared: “It is a great pleasure to welcome this exhibition as a preview to the opening of the Quai Branly Museum, where eight Aboriginal artists are participants in the creation of the architectural décor, including Judy Watson, from Queensland. The promotion of Australian Indigenous art is an important priority for the Australian Embassy in France”.
This exhibition follows Sesserae: The Works of Dennis Nona of May 2005 in Brisbane (Dell Gallery, Griffith University) that retraced the artist’s steps through his first works. After Paris, Australia: The Young Man and the Sea. The Engraved Work of Dennis Nona will be presented in London.
Australia’s oldest ARIA winner, Seaman Dan, whose last CD, Perfect Pearl, netted the Best World Music Album¹ award of 2004, is planning to launch his latest gem in style in Cairns this month. The legendary Torres Strait singer and former deep sea diver will celebrate the release of Island Way, the first album on his recently-created own label, Steady Steady, at the Civic Theatre on Wednesday, April 19.
The Cairns concert will come in the wake of a headline performance by Seaman Dan at the 2006 National Folk Festival in Canberra.
Actor Norah Bagari, who played Lucy in the popular SBS TV series RAN, will MC the show. Other special guests will include a trio of hula dancers.
Last year Seaman Dan received the prestigious Australian Council for the Arts Red Ochre Award, which recognises indigenous artists who make an outstanding contribution to the development of their culture, both nationally and internationally. He also represented Australia at World Expo in Japan. This celebrated septuagenarian was the subject of a 30 minutes documentary screened several times on ABC TV last year.
Uncle Seaman’s songs, which convey the colourful history and laidback lifestyle of his native islands, were featured in the RAN series and in a special aired on Radio National recently.
Island Way is Seaman Dan¹s most ambitious album to date, and includes songs from across
Oceania, including Hawaii, Fiji and Norfolk Island.
KickArts, Cairns will be featuring works by Alick Tipoti. This award winning printmaker from the Torres Strait has recently printed new work at KickArts with master printer Theo Tremblay. His striking black and white linocuts and hand coloured linocut kaidaral works vividly portray traditional Torres Strait stories and document themes important to the cultural life of the Torres Strait.
Tipoti was born on Waiben (Thursday Island) in 1975 and holds a Bachelor of Visual Arts (Printmaking) from the Canberra School of Art. He is currently teaching at Tropical North Queensland Institute of TAFE on Thursday Island.
Exhibition Continues: Tuesday 28 March to Saturday 6 May 2006 Time: 10:am - 5:00pm Tuesday to Saturday Where:KickArts Shop
