WARMUN ART CENTRE

6 Dec

AUSTRALIA, COURTESY OF TIM MELVILLE GALLERY, NEW ZEALAND

Warmun Art Centre is located 200km south of Kununurra, Western Australia in the East Kimberley. The Gija artists of Warmun have built an international reputation for their rich velvety paintings made using hand-collected and crushed natural pigments and charcoal from their land. Each work draws simultaneously on traditional Ngarranggarni (Dreamings) as well as on contemporary perspectives, keeping stories alive in a rapidly changing environment while maintaining cultural connections to country.

In a 2019 interview with the Australian magazine ‘Art Collector’, New Zealand gallerist Tim Melville commented:

“Formally, of course, the paintings coming out of Warmun are gorgeous. The rich dark ochres and sharp, clear outlines are luscious and satisfying, and it’s obvious that Rover Thomas’s legacy is alive and well.

More than that, though, Warmun artworks underscore the resonance between Australian Aboriginal attitudes towards ‘country’ and Maori attitudes towards ‘whenua’ in Aotearoa.

The fact that the Gija artists from Warmun paint their country with their country is a powerful metaphor. And seeing their paintings here in the South Pacific – having travelled thousands of miles from the Kimberleys in Western Australia – we feel we have been gifted taonga from our cousins across the water.”