D.O.B: 1945-2021
LANGUAGE GROUP: Anmatyerre
COMMUNITY: Utopia, NT
Gloria Petyarre was born circa 1945 in the region of Utopia, located 270kms northeast from Alice Springs. Her language is Anmatyerre and her country is Aknangkere. Gloria is one of seven sisters who are also artists, such as the well-known Kathleen Petyarre, Nancy Petyarre, Violet Petyarre and Ada Bird Petyarre.
Gloria first gained recognition as an artist working in the medium of Batik, exhibiting with other Utopia women in shows around Australia and abroad from 1977 to 1987. In 1988 Gloria took up the medium of canvas and painted her first work for CAAMA (The Central Australian Aboriginal Media Association) in the exhibition titled –Utopia Women’s Painting; The First Works of Canvas; a Summer Project 1988 – 1989. In 1990 –1991, Gloria travelled to Ireland, London and India as a representative of the Utopia women accompanying the exhibition Utopia – A Picture Story. The exhibition was mounted in Dublin at the Royal Hibernian Academy; Tandanya, Adelaide; and The Meat Market Gallery, Melbourne.
In 1991, Gloria had her first solo exhibition at Australian Galleries in New York and at Utopia Art, Sydney, where she had other solo shows from 1993 to 1995. Gloria’s work has been included in major survey exhibitions including: Art Gallery of New South Wales touring Aboriginal Women’s Exhibition, 1991; Flash Painting – National Gallery of Australia, 1992; The Body Paint Collection at Bishop Museum, Hawaii, 1992, which also toured the United States. In 1993 Gloria received a Tapestry Commission for the Victorian Tapestry Workshop and in 1994 for the Law Court in Brisbane. In 1995/96 Gloria received a Full Fellowship grant from the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Board of the Australia Council, and in March 1999 was awarded the coveted Wynne prize. Gloria was the first Aboriginal artist to receive this prestigious award for landscape painting.
Gloria’s work features in the collection of almost every major Art Gallery in each Australian capital city and also in the Holmes à Court collection. In 1998, a work on paper was acquired by the Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery. Also in 1998 a major canvas was acquired by the Levi Collection in Seattle, USA, and a Kansas City institution requested Gloria in conjunction with her husband, Ronnie Price, to design a mural which is now a highlighted main attraction. She is featured on the cover of Michael Bolton’s The Art of Utopia and more recently in Fire and Shadow by Anna Voight and Nevill Drury and also in New Visions: New Perspectives by Anna Voight. Gloria is featured in the book Dreamings of The Desert, published recently by The Art Gallery of South Australia.
Gloria’s main Dreamings are Mountain Devil, Bush Medicine and Aknangkere Growth. In Mountain Devil Dreaming Gloria uses a bold linear design accompanied by a small amount of dot work to depict this small lizard like creature. Alternatively Gloria may cover the entire canvas using small intricate dots in various colours creating an almost three-dimensional effect. Both styles are indicative of Gloria’s extraordinary talent for colour and pattern.
Gloria also developed a series of works, even more contemporary in style, known as Atnangkere Growth. In these paintings Gloria depicts her country using lines & swirls of colour that run onto the canvas and are intermingled with a variety of dot work. These paintings are rich in texture and are testament to Gloria’s artistic creativity. By far her most popular style has been Bush Medicine Dreaming In these works, Gloria depicts the leaves of a particular type of shrub that has medicinal qualities and which Gloria, as a healer, is well practiced in.
Gloria uses a range of different brush strokes ranging from the large to the very fine using colours, which represent the growth of the leaves at certain times of the year. The expert use of colour and movement displayed in these pieces confirm Gloria’s status as a sophisticated contemporary artist.
Gloria sadly passed away in 2021 and will be dearly missed.
EXHIBITIONS:
2021 Private Collection | Private View: One Collector’s Passion & Soul, Cooee Art, Redfern.2021 Abstraction, Utopia Art, Sydney.
2021 Country in Mind, University of the Sunshine Coast, QLD.
2021 Voyage across Aboriginal Australia – Founders’ Favourites, Fondation Burkhardt-Felder Arts et Culture, Moitiers, Switzerland.
2021 Top Ten Artists 2020, Kate Owen Gallery, Sydney.
2021 Big Names Little Paintings, Cooee Art Gallery, Sydney.
2020 Colours of Spring, Kate Owen Gallery, Sydney.
2020 Pointillism Perfection, Art Mob, Hobart.
2020 Still in the Desert, FireWorks Gallery, Brisbane.
2020 Director’s Choice 2020, Kate Owen Gallery, Sydney.
2020 Top Ten – Our Most Popular Artists 2019, Kate Owen Gallery, Sydney.
2019 Summer Show & Art Parade, Salt, Queenscliff, VIC.
2019 Defining tradition | black + white, Kate Owen Gallery, Sydney.
2019 International Women’s Day, Kate Owen Gallery, Sydney.
2019 Defining tradition | the colurists, Kate Owen Gallery, Sydney.
2019 Landscape Colours, Japingka Gallery, Fremantle.
2018 Earth’s Creation 2: Emily Kame Kngwarreye & Family, Kate Owen Gallery, Sydney.
2017 A SWEEP continues, FireWorks Gallery, Brisbane.
2017 Sacred Marks, JGM Gallery, London.
2017 Utopia – The artists of Delmore Downs, Yaama Ganu Gallery, Moree.
2016 Utopia Sisters – The Petyarre Women, Delmore Gallery with RedSea Gallery, Brisbane.
2009 Size Matters, Kate Owen Gallery, Sydney.
2009 5th Shalom Gamarada Aboriginal Art Exhibition, University of NSW, Sydney.
2009 Abstraction, Utopia Art, Sydney.
2008 Gooch’s Utopia, Flinders University, Adelaide.
2006 National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington DC, USA.
2006 Utopia, Flinders Lane Gallery, Melbourne.
2006 National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington DC.
2004 Fremantle Arts Centre, Fremantle.
2004 Curtin University of Technology, Perth.
2004 Ivan Dougherty Gallery, COFA, NSW.
2004 The Women’s Show, Vivien Anderson Gallery, Melbourne.
2004 Utopia: Gloria, Barbara, Minnie, Flinders Lane Gallery, Melbourne.
2003 Chapel off Chapel, Melbourne.
2003 National Gallery of Victoria at Federation Square, Melbourne.
2002 Singapore Art Museum, Singapore
2002 Knut Grothe Galeri, Charlottlenlund, Copenhagen
2002 Two Thirds Sky, Hazelhurst Regional Gallery & Arts Centre, NSW
2002 The Utopia Six, Flinders Lane Gallery, Melbourne
2002 Royal Exhibition Hall, Melbourne
2002 Gallery Rai, Tokyo, Japan
2002 Chapel off Chapel, Melbourne
2002 National Gallery of Victoria at Federation Square, Melbourne
2001 Brisbane City Gallery, Brisbane.
2001 Kunst der Gegenwart, Vienna, Austria.
2001 Manawatu Gallery, New Zealand.
2000 FireWorks Gallery, Brisbane.
2000 Australian National University, Canberra.
2000 Old Parliament House, Canberra.
2000 Royal Exhibition Hall, Melbourne.
1999 My Dreaming, Redrock Gallery, Melbourne.
1999 Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi, Melbourne.
1999 Art Gallery of Western Australia, Perth.
1999 Embassy of Australia, Washington, U.S.A.
1999 Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, U.S.A.
1999 New England Regional Art Museum.
1998 Araluen Arts Centre, Alice Springs.
1998 Chapman Gallery, Canberra.
1998 The Adelaide Festival Theatre, Adelaide.
1998 Propositions Australiennes, Galerie Luc Queyrel, Paris.
1997 Instant Pictures, Utopia Art, Sydney.
1997 Galerie de Stassart, Bruxelles.
1997 Sutton Gallery, Melbourne.
1996 Old Parliament House, Canberra.
1996 Niagara Galleries, Melbourne.
1996 William Mora Galleries, Melbourne.
1996 Royal Exhibition Hall, Melbourne.
1996 S.H. Ervin Gallery, Sydney.
1995 Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi, Melbourne.
1995 Mitchell Galleries, State Library of NSW, Sydney.
1995 National Gallery of Australia, Canberra.
1995 Aboriginal and Tribal Art Centre, Sydney.
1995 Canberra Museum of Art, Gifu, Japan.
1995 National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne.
1995 Powerhouse Museum, Sydney.
1995 Art Gallery of NSW, Sydney.
COLLECTIONS:
Museum of Victoria, Melbourne Powerhouse Museum, Sydney British Museum.
Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford, USA Campbelltown City Art Gallery.
Flinders University, South Australia.
Gold Coast City Art Gallery Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery Riddoch Art Gallery, SA.
Woollongong City Art Gallery.
Griffith University Collection Queensland University of Technology University of New South Wales University of the Sunshine Coast, QLD.
Art Bank Sydney.
Allen, Allen & Hemsley Baker-McKenzie.
Janet Holmes à Court Collection.
Kerry Stokes Collection.
James D. Wolfensohn Collection Macquarie Bank, Sydney.
Westpac, New York.
AWARDS:
2009 Kings School Art Prize, Sydney – Winner.
2008 25th NATSIAA, Darwin – Finalist.
2007 Wynne Prize, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney – Finalist.
2006 Wynne Prize, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney – Finalist.
2005 Wynne Prize, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney – Finalist.
2004 Wynne Prize, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney – Finalist & Highly Commended.
2004 Fremantle Print Award 2004, Fremantle Arts Centre, Fremantle – Finalist.
2003 20th NATSIAA, Darwin – Finalist.
2002 Redlands Westpac Art Prize, Mosman Art Gallery, Sydney – Finalist.
2000 5th National Indigenous Heritage Art Award 2000, (Reconciliation Prize), Old Parliament House, Canberra – Finalist Canberra, ACT.
2000 Top 50 Collectable Artists, Australian Art Collector Magazine.
1999 Top 50 Collectable Artists, Australian Art Collector Magazine.
1996 Full Fellowship Grant, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Board, the Australia Council.
1994 Tapestry Commission for the Law Courts, Brisbane.
See below some of her beautiful pieces for sale:
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Gloria Petyarre ‘110522’$7,260.00
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Gloria Petyarre ‘10182’$15,290.00
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Gloria Petyarre/Freddy Purla ‘05110’$4,840.00
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Gloria Petyarre/Freddy Purla ‘05160’$4,840.00