Looking Forward Looking Back

‘Looking forward, looking back’ presents a suite of etchings by Bindi Mwerre Anthurre Artists.

When visiting the Bindi art room there is a quiet and focused energy in the space, with artists engrossed in storytelling, reflection and the imaginative plane. Their works are transportive, windows to that ‘other’ space.

Predominantly painters it is fascinating to see the artists’ disparate styles realised in the medium of etching. With a reduced palette and a more delineated process of constructing the images it brings different, yet essential elements to the fore.

Billy Benn was the founding artist of the studio and had a close friendship and working relationship with Adrian Robertson, which is reflected in the conversation between these works. There are shared principles as well as their distinctive voices. The landscape is a central character, its brooding forms have a strong presence and are imbued with a subtle, latent energy.

Robertson expresses the thrust of ranges from the earth towering in alchemic billows. A brilliant colourist - purples and charcoal on a mustard ground reflect this flair. The balance of form and planes of colour give them a weightiness.

Benn details the sweeping vectors of past explosive volcanic activity. This sense of deep time is echoed in the palette. The interplay of fine lines with bleeds of arterial colour creates a beautifully balanced composition. It gives a sense of a view into the otherworldly or perhaps deeper within.

The mark of a line in Central Desert art is very important not only for its symbolic powers, but compositionally and figuratively. This series plays with a sharpness and dissolution of form through linework.

The fine lines in Jane Mervin’s etchings give the works a lightness that makes the figures seem to hum. She employs a fleetness of markmaking to create a series of expressive, apparition-like animals. The works share her love of birds, especially owls, a subject often reiterated.

Lance James employs the energetic scatter of lines to trace cowboys in motion, with their delicate agitations forming ghost trails of movement. The monochromatic palette throws the figures into relief honing the excitement and manoeuvres of the muster.

The Bindi Mwerre Anthurre artists invite us into their worlds, they share the vivid matrix of people, animals and country in a holistic narrative.

By Thea Perkins