c. 1945. Atnangker Soakage, north east of Alice Springs in the Northern Territory, Australia.
This artist's profile was developed by Anthea Paull during 2014 at The University of Queensland as a part of the Visual Arts Curating and Writing course, convened by Dr Allison Holland.
Gloria Tamerre Petyarre is one of the most significant Aboriginal artists living and working in Australia. Her work is heavily influenced from a life spent in the Utopia community of the Northern Territory. Petyarre’s earliest influence came from her aunt, Emily Kame Kngwarreye (deceased 2006) who became one of Australia’s most renowned and culturally important contemporary painters. Petyarre’s first became interested in art making practices after participating in the Utopia Women's Silk Batik Group, formed in 1977 and initiated by the Central Australian Aboriginal Media Association (CAAMA), of which Petyarre and Kngwarreye were founding members. The enormous success of the Women’s Silk Batik Group, both in Australia and internationally, led to another successful initiative in 1988 by CAAMA. The works that resulted from this initiative were exhibited at the S.H. Erwin Gallery in Sydney and several other notable galleries across Australia. This signaled the beginning of the Utopian Art Movement and Petyarre’s career, which gained attention both in Australia and internationally. Petyarre’s knowledge of traditional Atnangker culture, her ancestors and Dreaming stories permeate through all of her practice and can be seen as Petyarre’s most substantial influences. Such influences are seen throughout Petyarre’s most significant works “Bush Medicine”, “Mountain Devil”, “Awelye” and “Atnangkere Growth”.Petyarre’s first solo exhibition took place in 1991 in Sydney followed by an international solo exhibition in New York. In 1999 Petyarre was awarded the prestigious Art Gallery of New South Wales Wynne Prize for her bush medicine painting “Leaves". Petyarre continues to paint in the Utopia community, in recent years her work has deviated from finer medicine leaf works to large scale 'Big Leaf' paintings produced with giant expressionist style brush strokes that meld colour on the canvas to obtain a variety of captivating painterly effects.
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