A distant Western Australian artist has received the significant prize at Australia’s most prestigious Indigenous art awards with a bold portray spending homage to a sacred web page on his father’s nation.

Lake Baker by Spinifex Artwork Challenge artist Timo Hogan was named the overall winner of the 2021 Nationwide Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Artwork Awards (NATSIAAs) at a ceremony broadcast on the internet from Darwin’s Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory (MAGNT) on Friday night time.

The piece, which was painted employing a palette knife, depicts Lake Baker and tells of the development story at the rear of it.

“I am painting Lake Baker. It really is a sacred spot,” Mr Hogan reported.

“My father showed me the Tjukurpa (generation story) when I was a boy.”

He additional that the web site was highly sacred but he could only inform section of the tale.

Mr Hogan is from the distant group of Tjuntjuntjara, about 650 kilometres north-east of Kalgoorlie in Western Australia’s Goldfields-Esperance region.

Some of the finalists' artworks on display at the MAGNT.
Some of the finalists’ artworks on screen at the MAGNT.(

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The artist, aged in his late 40s and a person of the awards’ youngest finalists, claimed he felt honoured to have gained the awards’ major prize.

“I am really satisfied to have received this award. It will make me feel potent inside,” he claimed.

“Portray is essential for Anangu to explain to their tales.

The judging panel explained Mr Hogan’s get the job done as a “masterful painting of global calibre” and explained it confirmed him as a “remarkably confident artist with talent that exceeds his age and working experience”.

The seven winners of the 2021 NATSIAAs, who were selected from a pool of 68 finalists short-outlined from an all round 248 entries, have been from the Northern Territory, Western Australia and Queensland.

Ishmael Marika sits in front of his late grandmother Ms M Wirrpanda's work.
Ishmael Marika approved the award on behalf of his late grandmother. (

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The performs on paper group winner was the late Ms M Wirrpanda, a Yirrkala artist who died just two months soon after ending her intricate fibre-tipped pen on paper piece Untitled.

Her grandson Ishmael Marika – also an artist who entered the awards – approved the prize on her behalf.

“She was thinking about her childhood time when she went accumulating oysters and shells, and in her intellect (she) was going out searching … so she had to produce that, place that into the paper,” he stated.

“Two months afterwards, she handed away. And this is what she did.”

Standard of finalists’ work ‘phenomenal’: Curator

Tiwi Island artist Pedro Wonaeamirri, whose do the job won the multimedia award, said painting was a way for him to connect with his culture.

“Successful the award for this year’s NATSIAAs, I truly feel pretty solid, satisfied and quite happy of myself,” he claimed.

All of the finalists’ artworks have been exhibited at the MAGNT, in which they will keep on being on show until eventually February.

MAGNT curator Rebecca Raymond stands next to the artworks of several NATSIAA finalists.
MAGNT curator Rebecca Raymond praised the regular of function of all the finalists in this year’s NATSIAAs.(

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MAGNT Aboriginal art and substance curator Rebecca Raymond reported the finalists’ functions have been of a really large calibre, which was specially remarkable offered the effects the COVID-19 pandemic had on artists.

“These new functions are produced by some of the gifted Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders throughout the state, and it’s a testament to their creativity and resilience that they’re able to create works in these COVID periods.”

Award ceremony held on the net for a 2nd calendar year

With the COVID-19 pandemic even now a problem for Indigenous communities across Australia, the 2021 NATSIAAs award ceremony was held on-line for the next year functioning.

Organisers have also again set up a virtual exhibition that allows anyone to watch the works on-line as shown at the museum, and in a new aspect, spectators will be equipped to use augmented truth to see any function in 3D in their have area.

Artist Dhambit Munungurr sits in her wheelchair, smiling, with her hands raised in celebration.
Dhambit Munungurr was happy when her work Bees at Gängän gained the bark portray award.(

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MAGNT director Marcus Schutenko reported organisers experienced at the time all over again embraced virtual platforms to showcase some of Australia’s greatest Indigenous artworks to as extensive an viewers as achievable.

“Together, we keep on to illuminate some of Australia’s most gifted Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders and their powerful breadth of artistic apply,” he explained.

NATSIAA winners:

  • Art Award – Lake Baker by Timo Hogan
  • Typical Portray Award – Wantili (Warntili, Canning Inventory Route Perfectly 25) by Bugai Whyoulter
  • Bark Painting Award – Bees at Gängän by Dhambit Munungurr
  • Performs on Paper Award – Untitled by Ms M Wirrpanda
  • Wandjuk Marika 3D Memorial Award – As a result of the Veil of Time by Hubert Pareroultja and Mervyn Rubuntja
  • Multimedia Award – Jilarti by Pedro Wonaeamirri
  • Rising Artist Award – Moongalba by Kyra Mancktelow