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January 26, 2008
It's Australia day. What better way to celebrate?
Kathleen Petyarre, Mountain Devil Lizard Dreaming (2007) Synthetic Polymer on Belgian Linen
According to Dean Chan's review of Christine Nicholls and Ian North, Genius of Place: the Life and Art of Kathleen Petyarre the consistent invocation of the journeying of Petyarre's Dreaming Ancestor, Arnkerrth, the Old Woman Mountain Devil or Thorny Devil Lizard in her paintings, can be understood as an intricate composite of personal memory, communal place, and pictorial symbology.
Chan adds:
Likewise, Nicholls points out that the seeming ‘aerial views’ presented in many of the paintings are best accounted for with reference to Anmatyerr systems of land-based epistemology. These systems of spatial knowledge or history of place are premised on the ability to reconstruct detailed and accurate mental maps of the land.
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