July/August 08
An Ever Expanding Universe (WA) > WA
Because of its title, my initial reaction to this exhibition was one of curiosity. Read More
Art Deco 1910 - 1939 (VIC) > VIC
With its Bakelite radio, Tamara De Lempicka painting and luxurious dressing table complete with intricate ivory inlays, the opening room of the National Gallery of Victoria’s Art Deco show says it all. Read More
Melbourne Art Fair (VIC) > VIC
With 80 commercial galleries, 10 project spaces, two specially commissioned installations and anticipated sales at the $10.5 million mark, the Melbourne Art Fair isn’t the sort of place to play things down. Read More
Puberty Blues
To stay sane in this world it is sometimes necessary to step back and laugh at the sheer nonsense that follows in the wake of a moral scandal. Read More
Robert Jenyns (NSW) > NSW
Pop psychologists and armchair analysts are masters of the succinct and the obvious. Read More
The enchanted forest: new gothic storytellers (VIC) > VIC
Curiouser and curiouser... a new approach to gothic. Read More
Turn, Turn, Turn: the past talks to the present (NSW) > NSW
Nick Waterlow is the only person to have curated more than one Biennale of Sydney. Read More
VIVID National Photographic Festival (ACT) > ACT
Australian photography festivals are seemingly multiplying at a rapid pace, with VIVID being the latest member to join the growing team. Read More
Talking Art with Lindsay Harris
By Judith McGrath
Judith McGrath: You commenced your art practice at a mature age. What started you on that road?
Lindsay Harris: I enrolled in the Associate Degree in Contemporary Aboriginal Art at University of Western Australia. I was lucky, the teachers saw I had something to say and they encouraged me. As much as I enjoyed the practical courses I wanted to learn more so I took the art theory unit ‘Art During the Twentieth Century’. The subject fascinated me. It opened my eyes to a whole new world; the world of art.
JM: What impact did that theory unit have on your art practice?
LH:
I drew inspiration from artists of other times and cultures, especially their philosophy, spirituality, attitudes to land and history, and their use of abstract imagery. We all have different relationships to particular places and I wanted to connect with my ancestral lands of Kwolyin. These lands are more than my Dreaming, they are my awakening and my heart space. It is difficult to articulate that on canvas. I cannot paint this landscape as Turner or Constable would, or how a camera sees it. Learning about Jackson Pollock and Mark Rothko, along with Clifford Possum, Rover Thomas and Emily Kame Kngwarreye has helped me find new ways of depicting my homeland.
JM: How did these artists inspire you and how did their work help you clarify your ideas about painting?
LH:
I appreciate Pollock’s continuous development and his freedom in the way he puts paint on the canvas. Rothko’s colour field paintings impressed on me that there are alternative ways of seeing landscape, the sky, the earth even below the earth. Just as there is activity under the surface of the earth I would like to give the viewer the impression that there is more under the surface of the painting.
Possum’s motif oriented paintings tell the stories of his country from a religious and a social perspective. I am also telling stories. Thomas’s art is a form of cartography referring directly to the form and features of the land. He used natural materials such as ochres and gum from the regions he depicted. At this point I am experimenting with similar materials from my land in my work. Thomas is also an inspiration as he began painting in his later years. Kngwarreye is able to paint diverse subjects. Her art goes further then just cultural identity, it has a language of its own and it is through her work that much of my inspiration has been drawn. I am also inspired by these artists’ use of large canvasses and I am intending to extend my work to larger surfaces.
JM: Do you return to your homeland often?
LH:
Yes. I left Kwolyin when I was twelve, now I go back often to walk my homeland and connect with it again. The town and surrounding districts have been the main inspiration for most of my art. It is where I feel most comfortable;
Lindsay Harris, Intrusion, pigment, ochre & resin on hemp, 2007, 100 x 100cm. Al images courtesy the artist and Emerge Art Space, Perth.
Lindsay Harris,Old man on the hill, pigment, ochre & resin on hemp, 2007, 100 x 1000cmit is the land of my people; it holds memories for me and inspires my art. I also go there to collect ochres and pipe-clay, and the gums that provide an adhesive for the natural pigments.
But returning to Kwolyin is more then just gathering materials or observing the landscape. It’s a journey of self-discovery, it’s remembering how the old people used to live; it’s endeavoring to discover the Dreaming. I know some of the old people who knew the language, the stories and songs and the more I inquire the more I learn.
JM: Where do you think your art is going?
LH:
I’m not sure yet. Making marks is an increasingly important theme in my work. Marks, like carving and attooing are informative. For example, traditional body scarring speaks of an individual’s experiences. Marking the ground was important to my grandmother. Every night she would use sticks to sweep the ground around her house in a raking manner to leave marks. Each morning she could identify the tracks of those friends or animals that came near during the night. And in a time when children were taken from their families, my mother and her siblings inscribed their names on a large granite rock that faced the railway so those on the train could see them. These marks were signs of information, security and defiance.
Sometimes I use sticks when doing my art and like my mother and grandmother I leave my mark. Scarring the body, the landscape and finally the canvas represents a continuity of this traditional act. I am making connections with marks that signify language, story and song.
My art is taken from what I see, what is revealed to me through the stories and songs that have been given to me. I want to concentrate on my country, the old stories and the songs. I want to make my own song.
Judith McGrath is an arts writer and reviewer based in Perth.
