Bay Gallery Home recently wrote a feature article about Aboriginal art for London based I-M Magazine (Intelligent Magazine for Inquisitive Minds). An excerpt is available online with the full article published in the new issue now available at all good outlets including Harvey Nichols, Holland Park News, Princess News and Wardour News. The article serves as an introduction to Aboriginal art giving the reader a brief history of Aboriginal art and a broad insight into the different styles and areas the art hails from.
Bay Gallery Home adds wallets and coin purses to its expanding gift and homeware range. This leather vegetable dyed collection features Aboriginal Dreamtime stories from the Central Desert, Western Australian and coastal areas of the Northern Territory. They are made in West Bengal using the ancient Shanti craft reinvigorated by Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore during the Mahatma Ghandi era. Designs are applied using batik printing or hand painted. They are the product of a cross cultural exchange supporting Aboriginal artists and Kolkata - West Bengal artisans.
Each design comes with an explanation of its unique Dreamtime story. The wallets are secured by a zip which goes around the whole body - incredibly useful for keeping your cards and money safe while travelling.
More designs, sizes and colours available from February.
Sabrina is a young Aboriginal Central Desert artist related to the famous colour field abstractionist Shorty Jangala Robertson; like Shorty she paints Ngapa Jukurrpa (Pirlinyarnu) inheriting it from her father and grandfather who in turn learnt it from generations across millennia. Her mother is the world renowned artist Dorothy Napangardi (recently featured in the Australia exhibition at the Royal Academy). Mount Farewell (Pirlinyarnu) is where Sabrina's Dreaming sits in her traditional lands are. She has chosen to depict the sacred Dreamtime story, in a way unique to her, where water appears to travel across the canvas with small water soakages encased in the rain drops and native plants and animals dot the land.
In 2014 her work was selected for 'Same Country Same Jukurrpa' at the Australian Museum. Sabrina's painting was shown alongside hugely important artists of the desert community she comes from including Judy Napangardi Watson, Alma Nungarrayi Granites and Otto Jungarrayi Sims. The exhibition followed on from the world's first Aboriginal women only exhibition held at the Museum in 1992 entitled 'Woman Artists'. The new exhibitions aim was to show the development in artistic styles amongst the artists as they moved away from traditional circular dot painting to establish their unique styles as artists whilst sharing their ancestors stories.
You can by the painting in the gallery or online at www.baygalleryhome.com
Ngapa Jukurrpa Pirlinyarnu, Sabrina Nangala Robertson, Acrylic on linen 30x30cm
We are closing for our Christmas break midday 23 December 2017 so would like to thank our clients and collaborators for your support over 2017. Many exciting things are in the offing for 2018 so do keep an eye on our website, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin feeds.
On behalf of the Aboriginal artists we represent we'd like to thank you for supporting their artistic endeavours and communities.
Wishing you a very Happy Christmas and wonderful 2018.
My Country Green wallpaper hangs in the background
The winter nights have drawn in so why not look at our beautiful evening skies? Perhaps you'll see a cigar-shaped alien space ship (or meteor?) gliding through it. If you're sky is light polluted take inspiration from Australia's milky way as depicted on these teapots, mugs, sugar pots, cup and saucers, milk jugs and bowls. Alma's paintings were a sell out at her only solo UK exhibition held at Bay Gallery Home but her chinaware continues to be one of our most popular designs. Available online www.baygalleryhome.com or in the gallery.
Papunya Tula is the legendary site where the contemporary Aboriginal art movement bloomed becoming famous for its Western Desert dot art.
Amongst the different displaced Western Desert people's brought to Papunya Tula (Tula meaning small hill where a Honey ant dreaming sits) were Tommy Watson, Clifford Possum and Ningura Napurrula, each of whom went on to become wildly successful international artists.
The original company now operates from Alice Springs but we paid a visit to the existing art centre and found some of the sacred iconography depicted in the early works honoured while developing new interpretations of their ancient Dreamtime stories.
We had to keep a respectful distance while photographing the artists. Close up the paintings were breathtaking. Below is the landscape around the art centre.
