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T H E C O L L E C T I O N
2 0 1 3 R E V I E W
I ND I GENOUS AUSTRAL I AN ART
On the nineteenth-century Queensland frontier,
killing Aboriginal people and driving them off their
land was common colonial practice. To ‘disperse’
became a euphemism for the murder and
massacre of Aboriginal people. In
DISPERSED
2008, Brisbane‑based Badtjala artist Fiona Foley
has courageously unpacked centuries of a largely
unwritten Australian history, captured in one
‘loaded’ word. It is simultaneously a monument
to the Aboriginal people and an object of awakening
for those unaware of this history.
Fiona Foley
| Badtjala people |
DISPERSED
2008 | Charred laminated
wood, cast aluminium, .303 inch
calibre bullets, ed. 2/3 | 51 x 500 x
26cm | Purchased 2013. Queensland
Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art
Foundation
Shirley Macnamara is a fibre artist with a significant
career dating from the mid 1990s. Her work
Wingreeguu
2012 — a woven sculptural installation
based on traditional Indjilandji/Dhidhanu/Alyawarre
spinifex shelters — was commissioned and acquired
for APT7, and joins numerous weavings and objects
that have become part of the Gallery’s Collection
over the last decade.
Shirley Macnamara
| Indlandji/
Alyawarre people QLD |
Wingreeguu
2012 | Spinifex (
Triodiapungens
),
turpentine bush (
Acacia lysiphloia
),
yellow ochre | 190 x 241 x 160cm |
Commissioned for APT7. Purchased
2013. Queensland Art Gallery
Foundation Grant
