Kathleen Paddoon
c.1938-2019, Balgo Hills, Australia
Kathleen Paddoon spent part of her youth around Sturt Creek in the Australian desert, near the border between Western Australia and the Northern Territory. She later moved to the former Catholic mission of Old Balgo, before settling in Balgo Hills, also known as Wirrimanu.
Her rise to recognition in the art market began in the 2000s, driven by the intensity of her bold colors—red, white, and black—and the expressive quality of her brushstrokes. She is renowned for her depictions of Nakarra Nakarra, a site connected to the Seven Sisters Dreaming.
One of the rare desert artists to produce an extensive body of printmaking work, she has established herself as one of the most remarkable painter-printmakers in contemporary Aboriginal art. Even more than in her screen prints, she pushes the rich color density of aquatint to an unparalleled level of intensity.
Awards
Four times finalist : 2008, 2004, 2001, 1989, Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Awards, Museum and Art Gallery of Northern Territory, Darwin
Collections:
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney
Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide
UNSW, Sydney
Solo Exhibitions
2019 Nakarra Nakarra, Alcaston Gallery, Melbourne
2004 Scott Livesey Art Dealer, Melbourne
Selected Group Exhibitions
2018, 2007, 2006, 2004, 2003, 2000 Desert Mob, Araluen Art Centre, Alice Springs, Australia
2018 Artists from Balgo Hills, WA: An Archive Survey, Alcaston Gallery, Melbourne
2018 WAu! Focus in Western Australia, Rovaniemi Museum, Finland
2013 Traversing Borders: Art from the Kimberley, QUT Art Museum, Brisbane
2012 Warlayirit Artists, Artkelch Pro Community, Frieburg, Grassi Museum, Leipzig, Fabrik Der Kunste, Hamburg and Galerie Gunzoburg Bodensee (Lake Constance), Germany
2006 Warlayirti Suite, Alcaston Gallery, Melbourne
2005 Desert Inks, New Limited Edition Prints by Warlayirti Artists, Alcaston Gallery, Melbourne
2001 The Peter Bailie Acquisitive Art Award, Flinders Art Museum, Adelaide
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- Kathleen Paddoon – Nakarra Nakarra
Kathleen Paddoon
Nakarra Nakarra
2007
etching, limited edition of 30
60,5 x 47 cm paper ; 29,4 x 29,3 cm image
Well-known for her distinctive use of a limited palette of red, black, and white, Kathleen Paddoon creates spaces with vibrant, colourful brushstrokes that resonate through the Tjukurrpa. Her dense and significant dots carry the successive evocation of footprints, clumps of spinifex or rocks, caught between the stillness of a place and the traces of life that animate it.
The songlines appear, revealing life in the desert as much as they map it, from its creation by the Great Ancestors to the movements of their distant descendants. The black and white vibrate here with a particular sharpness to reveal their structure. Everything here participates in a rhythm, almost in a music.
Nakarra Nakarra, the site with which Kathleen Paddoon is connected, is part of the vast saga of the Seven Sisters, one of the most famous Aboriginal narratives.
Kathleen Paddoon
Nakarra Nakarra
2003
screenprint, limited edition of 50
64 x 48 cm
Kathleen Paddoon
Nakarra Nakarra
2007
etching, limited edition of 40
59 x 39 cm
