Show Extended!
A combination of overwhelming enthusiasm, strong sales and an unexpected cancellation has compelled me to import ten new canvases from Yeundemu and extend our annual exhibition of Australian Aboriginal paintings from the Central Desert through October! The new works are now at the top of the gallery page. Enjoy and please visit. We will do a FaceBook livestream this Friday, October 1st, from 5:40-6 PM. Get online and see the paintings installed.
Jeffrey Moose Gallery is proud to announce our annual exhibition of paintings by indigenous artists from Yuendumu in Australia’s Central Desert for the months of August and September. The exhibit runs from Friday, August 6th thru September 28th. Receptions will be held on First Friday, August 6th and First Friday, September 3rd from 6 to 8 PM. A Facebook livestream will run from 6 to 6:20 for those unable to attend.
2021 is a special year for the Australian Aboriginal Art world; the year marks the 50th Anniversary of the first dot paintings made in the Central Desert community of Papunya. Soon thereafter, similar works were being produced in the communities of Yuendumu and Utopia. A major 50th Anniversary exhibit had been scheduled at the Seattle Art Museum but was canceled due to Covid restrictions.
Traditional ground paintings by the Yuendumu artists, known as Warlukurlangu (Home of the Fire Dreaming) made history in Paris in 1989, part of the international survey, “Magiciennes De La Terre.” At this sensational exhibit of Indigenous art from throughout the world, a group of men from Yuendumu packed tons of desert earth and crushed flowers from home, shaping the material into an enormous “Ground Painting” to honor the Yarla Jukurrpa, a creation story about the bush potato.
Several works by Warlukurlangu Artists are on display in The Seattle Art Museum’s third floor galleries. It was through the Kaplan/Levy Collection shown at SAM that Jeffrey Moose was connected to this remote desert art coop. In 2006, Jeffrey and his father and son visited Yuendumu, establishing a continuing and fruitful relationship.
Dot paintings are images rendered from an aerial perspective which use symbols to represent people, animals, plants, weather systems and other forms in telling ancient creation stories. In their original form, these stories are part of the Song Lines, complex sets of story-poems recited in rhythmic pattern that link places across the Australian continent.
