ABIE LOY KEMARRE – ABORIGINAL ART
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Artist Profile · Northern Territory
Abie Loy Kemarre
Anmatyerre colourist famed for her Bush Hen Dreaming and Bush Medicine Leaves.
Born
1972
Language group
Eastern Anmatyerre
Skin name
Kemarre (also Akemarr)
Community
Mosquito Bore, Utopia, NT
Family
Abie Loy Kemarre was born in 1972 and comes from Mosquito Bore in the Utopia region, travelling between there, Adelaide Bore and Lake Nash (Alpurrurulam). Her father is Ray Loy Pwerle, and she paints stories from her grandfather’s Country, Artenya.
Her grandmother was the renowned Kathleen Petyarre, who taught her the fine, shimmering dot work that gives her paintings their remarkable depth. Abie watched her family paint from childhood and asked for her first canvas in 1994, at the age of 22.
Her work
Abie’s early paintings follow her grandmother’s style: delicate Bush Hen (bush turkey, or Australian bustard) Dreaming works built from tiny dots. A gifted colourist, she developed a bolder, more abstract style around 2001–02 in her Sandhills and Body Painting series. These works still tell her inherited Dreaming stories, but read as strongly abstract and expressionist.
She is now best known for her Bush Medicine Leaves, sweeping fields of fine strokes that seem to move across the canvas.
Bush Medicine Leaves
Sandhills
Body Painting
Fine dot work
Highlights
- 1997 – Exhibited at Documenta, Kassel, Germany
- 1997 and 2001 – Finalist, Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Award
- 2003 – First solo exhibition, Alcaston Gallery, Melbourne
- 2006 – Dreaming Their Way, National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington DC
- 2012 – Ancestral Modern, Seattle Art Museum
Collections
- National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
- Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide
- Seattle Art Museum, USA
- Kelton Foundation, Los Angeles, USA
- Musée des Confluences, Lyon, France
- Bridgestone Museum (Ishibashi Foundation), Tokyo
- Kerry Stokes Collection, Perth
- Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission Collection
Related artists
Abie’s grandmother Kathleen Petyarre and her relative Bernadine Kemarre Johnson also paint the family’s stories.
Buying Abie’s work
For authenticated paintings, buy through a recognised Indigenous art gallery such as Delmore Gallery, and always ask for a certificate of authenticity.
Paintings by Abie Loy Kemarre on eBay
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