Art exhibition by Mirdidingkingathi Juwarnda

Art exhibition by Mirdidingkingathi Juwarnda – Sally Gabori

From 3 July to 6 November 2022, the Cartier Foundation in Paris is exhibiting 31 paintings of Kaiadilt artist Mirdidingkingathi Juwarnda – Sally Gabori.

First Nations artist Sally Gabori (1924-2015) was born on Bentinck Island in the Gulf of Carpentaria in Australia. Her name incorporates the place of her birth – Mirdidingki – a small creek in the south of the island – and her totem animal Juwarnda, which is a dolphin. She lived on Mornington Island from 1948 after a cyclone flooded her land. She returned to Bentinck Island in the 1990s after Australia passed legislation which recognized the rights of the Kaiadilt to their land after years of fighting for land rights.

She began painting in 2005 at the age of eighty. Most of her paintings are topographical references to her land.

Her strong, unique sense of colour catapulted her to worldwide acclaim in contemporary art. Her wide flourishing brushstrokes, intense colour, and palette combination make it easy for the viewer to imagine the pigments and hues of her homeland and the influences of the countryside in her choice of colour, texture, and form.

In the ten years of her painting career, she painted over 2,000 canvases. She began small and transitioned quickly to monumental canvases over six metres (19.5 feet) long in 2007.

This is my second exhibition viewing of the artist’s works. The first was when I lived in Canberra. It was at the Drill Hall Gallery of the Australian National University in Canberra, Australia, from 4 April to 5 May 2013. The exhibition was called, ‘A Survey Exhibition of Paintings: 2005-2012.’ She displayed pieces depicting her landscape – such and sandbanks – but more specifically, the creatures in her landscape, such as ‘All the fish’ (2005).

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