Gloria Petyarre (Pitjara)

DOB: c.1945
Born: THE BOUNDARY BORE, UTOPIA, NORTHERN TERRITORY
SKIN NAME PETYARRE (PITJARA)
LANGUAGE ANMATYERRE

About Artist:
Gloria was born around 1945 in her country of Atnangkere Soakage, Northern Territory. In the early 1980s, Gloria created her first painting on canvas after progressing from the Utopia Women’s silk batik group which began in 1977.

Utopia is situated approximately 300km north east of Alice Springs. A former cattle station, it first became renowned in the 70s and 80s for its batiks produced as artworks and as textiles. The group of women who moved from creating batiks to painting with acrylic on canvas included: the famous Emily Kame Kngwarreye (c.1910-1996) and amongst others, her niece Gloria Petyarre.

Regarded as one of Utopia?s most significant artists, Gloria?s work has increased in scale and precision in recent years. Her country is the inspiration for all her art. Her paintings are constantly evolving into higher levels of abstraction, as she experiments with line and colour. The main Dreamings that she paints are the Bush Medicine Leaves, Mountain Devil Lizard, Bean, Emu, Pencil Yam, Grass Seed and Small Brown Grass and well as the traditional body paint designs worn by women.
Regularly limiting her palette to contrasting, often dichromatic colour, Gloria most frequently paints the effect of the bush medicine leaf as it dries on the desert floor. Gloria Petyarre?s meticulous dotting technique is reminiscent of optical art, the fineness of her detail and repetitive patterning create a moving surface effect across the canvas.

A multi award winner, Gloria won the AGNSW Wynne Prize for landscape painting in 1999 and has been selected as a finalist four times since. Her work has featured many times in the most prominent Aboriginal art prize in the country, the “Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Art Award”. She has travelled internationally with her work and is held in major collections both nationally and internationally. Gloria?s record at auction was also topped in November 2007 for Bush Medicine, 2004, that brought $78,000 + buyers premium against an estimate of $40,000 - $60,000.



Awards:

2004: Wynne Prize for Landscape Painting, highly commended
1999: Wynne Prize for Landscape Painting, winning entry
1993: Design for tapestry for Victorian Tapestry Workshop
1993: Mural for Kansas City Zoo


Major collections:

Adelaide Festival Centre Collection
Allen, Allen & Helmsley
Art Gallery of New South Wales
Baker-McKenzie
British Museum
Campbelltown City Art Gallery
Flinders University, South Australia
Gold Coast City Art Gallery
Griffith University Collection
James D. Wolfensohn Collection
Macquarie Bank
Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery
Museum & Art Galleries of the Northern Territories
Museum of Victoria, Melbourne
National Gallery of Victoria
Powerhouse Museum, Sydney
Queensland Art Gallery
Queensland University of Technology
Riddoch Art Gallery, S.A.
Robert Holmes a? Court Collection
Singapore Art Museum
Supreme Court, Brisbane
University of New South Wales
University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland
Victorian Museum
Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford, U.S.A
Westpac, New York
Wollongong City Art Gallery
Wollongong University Collection


Solo exhibitions:

2003: Flinders Lane Gallery, Melbourne
1999: Recent Paintings, Flinders Lane Gallery
1998: Utopia Art, Sydney
1998: Robert Steele Gallery, Adelaide
1997: New Directions, Flinders Lane Gallery
1996: Fire Works Gallery, Brisbane



Selected group exhibitions:

2008: Three Petyarre?s, Kate Owen Gallery, Sydney
2006: Utopia, Flinders Lane Gallery
2004: Utopia, Gloria, Barbara, Minnie, Flinders Lane Gallery
2002: The Utopia Six, Flinders Lane Gallery
1999: Wynne Prize exhibition „Winning entry?
1999: Quadrivium Gallery, Sydney
1999: "Bush Garden", Japingka Gallery, Fremantle
1999: Utopia, BMG Art, Adelaide
1998: The Adelaide Festival Theatre
1998: "The Aknangkere Growth Paintings" - First Release, Chapman Gallery, Canberra 1998 SCEGGS Redlands Art Award, Sydney
1998: "The Ladies of Utopia", Chapman Gallery, Canberra
1998: "Utopia IV" Quadrivium Gallery, Sydney
1998: Utopia, Works on Paper, Flinders Lane Gallery
1998: Paintings from Utopia, Flinders Lane Gallery
1998: ARATEXPO New York in association with Mandurah Ltd, New York
1998: "Women Painters of the Desert", Fire Works Gallery, Brisbane
1998: The Importance of Ochre, Flinders Lane Gallery
1997: Fireworks Gallery, Brisbane
1997: Utopia Art, Flinders Lane Gallery
1997: Selected entrant in the Telstra 14th National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Award
1997: Participated in the artist in residence program at the Art Gallery of South Australia in the exhibition "Dreamings of the Desert"
1997: Dacou Gallery, Adelaide
1997: Quadrivium Gallery, Sydney
1996: Recent Paintings From Utopia, Flinders Lane Gallery
1996: Quadrivium Gallery, Sydney
1996: Framed, Darwin
1995: Dacou Gallery, Adelaide
1990: Utopia Artists, Flinders Lane Gallery



Auction records:

Title: Earth's Creation, 1995
Details: Synthetic polymer paint on canvas, 164 x 354 cm,
Auction Price: A$78,000
Auction House: Lawson~Menzies, Australian Aboriginal Art, Sydney, 14/11/2007, Lot No. 58

394 works listed from the 1970's onwards.