Owen Yalandja
AUSTRALIAN. KUNINJKU, B. 1961
Kuninjku artist Owen Yalandja is a senior member of the Dangkorlo clan, the custodians of an important yawkyawk site. In the early 1980s, Yalandja learned carving from his father, renowned artist Crusoe Kuningbal who invented, in the early 1960’s the representation of mimih spirit in sculptural form for use in a trade ceremony called Mamurrng. Members of the Darnkolo clan have re-established an outstation community at Barrihdjowkkeng near a billabong that is a Yirridjdja moiety sacred site for the yawkyawk spirits. Yawkyawk or young spirit girls live in this billabong and their shadows can occasionally be seen as they humans who approach. They are girls who transformed into mermaid-like figures with fish tails. The identity of the Darnkolo clan is very much related to the Yawkyawk djang (dreaming) for which they have spiritual and practical responsibility. Yalandja and his brother Crusoe Kurddal followed their father's legacy but over the years have found their own distinct styles.
In the early 1990s, Yalandja experimented with the dot patterns his father taught him, and created V shaped marks to represent the scales of the watery beings. As Yalandja says, “I make it [yawkyawk] according to my individual ideas. My father used to decorate them with dots. A long time ago, he showed me how to do this. But this style is my own, no one else does them like this.” Yalandja continued to innovate. In the early 1990s Yalanja experimented with the patterns of dots taught to him by his father and created new arrangements; first in arcs to suggest scales, but later he developed small v- shaped marks to suggest individual scales. Yalandja works exclusively with the kurrajong tree for carving and carefully selects trunks which can be thin and curvilinear to give his figures a sinuous appearance.
Yalandja’s work is represented in major International collections and has been exhibited at major institutions both locally and globally including at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, National Gallery of Australia, Melbourne Museum, Bargehouse Gallery, London and Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. His work has also been presented at the Venice Biennale, Biennale of Sydney and the National Australian Indigenous Triennial.
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2015 Owen Yalandja - Seva Frangos Art, Subiaco, Australia
2011 Yawkyawk: Water Spirit Carvings from Maningrida - Rebecca Hossack, LondoN
2010 Owen Yalandja: Yawkyawk - Seva Frangos Art, Subiaco, Australia
2008 Owen Yalandja - Annandale Galleries, Sydney, NSW
2005 Owen Yalandja - William Mora Galleries, Melbourne, VIC
2004 Owen Yalandja - Annandale Galleries, Sydney, NSW
2002 Owen Yalandja - Redback Gallery, Brisbane, Australia
2000 Owen Yalandja. Water Spirit Sculptures from Barrihdjowkeng - Aboriginal & Pacific Arts, Sydney, NSW
COLLECTIONS
British Museum (London, England)
Hood Museum of Art (Hanover, NH)
Kluge-Ruhe Aboriginal Art Collection, UVA (Charlottesville, VA)
National Gallery of Australia (Canberra Act, Australia)
National Gallery of Victoria - Australia (Melbourne, Australia)
Queensland National Art Gallery and Museum (Brisbane, Australia)
AWARDS
2018 Finalist, NATSIAA, MAGNT, Darwin, NT
2017 Finalist, NATSIAA, MAGNT, Darwin, NT
2016 Finalist, NATSIAA, MAGNT, Darwin, NT