There’s a lifetime of culture in the intricacy of landscape captured in Nellie Ngampa Coulthard’s paintings. In her work, she focusses on memories of her childhood in the central desert of South Australia. She was born near Oodnadatta in 1947 and spent time out bush with her family, travelling frequently as part of her father’s work as a shepherd at the remote Wintinna Homestead Station. Prominently featured in her paintings is her favourite amongst the desert flora and fauna – the yellow Acacia Murrayana Wattle, Tjuntala.
Accordingly, Coulthard’s second solo exhibition at Alcaston Gallery, Melbourne is titled Tjuntala Ngurangka – Wattle Country. Of this work she says, “I love painting the trees and flowers of the Country where I grew up – Yankunytjatjara Country near Oodnadatta. After the rain and before the summer starts, the landscape changes colour with wattle blossoms… the bushes of Tjuntala [have] flower-like yellow pom-poms, they’re very pretty. The seeds are small and lined up in a row inside brown seed pods.”
Coulthard’s painting practice began in the 2000s only after she retired from teaching at the pre-school at Indulkana (in the Aṉangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara Lands). Her family moved to Indulkana in the early days of the community and Coulthard gravitated to teaching the Aṉangu children in a wiltja (hand-built shelter), located near the banks of Iwantja Creek.
As an artist she has developed a distinctive style, which depicts the wattle as an anchor within the picture plane, surrounded by vibrantly-coloured iconography of terrain and Country drawn from her memories of people, events and place.
Alcaston Gallery has shown Coulthard’s paintings in group exhibitions since 2017, with her first solo in 2021 nearly selling out. Alcaston Gallery is known for brokering emerging talents, particularly from Aboriginal communities and found, in Coulthard’s work, “a totally unique interpretation of Country”.
Alcaston Gallery manager Adriana Del Medico continues, “Her distinctive and intricate painting technique, rendered in vibrant, radiant colours beautifully reflects the desert landscape, resulting in an almost three-dimensional quality that gives movement and fluidity to her landscapes. The complex compositions draw the viewer in, placing them within her beloved Country, amongst the intoxicating Acacia Murrayana Wattle.”
This second solo follows significant success at Sydney Contemporary 2022, with audiences drawn to the engaging qualities of her work, its meandering line that seems to encompass both a micro and macro expression of the desert. Del Medico notes that, “There is a beautiful sentimentality associated with her art, as she references her memories as a young girl, surrounded by the beautiful and diverse flora of the central and eastern deserts. Her interpretations of her environment create an aesthetic quality that resonates with art collectors and art enthusiasts alike.»
Coulthard has been shortlisted for the prestigious Wynne Prize at the Art Gallery of New South Wales in 2022, 2019 and 2018, and had her work acquired by the Queensland Art Gallery / Gallery of Modern Art. Internationally her work was included in Before Time Began at Fondation Opale, Switzerland in 2019, Kulata Tjuta in Brittany, France in 2020 and UnLearning Australia at SeMA, Seoul in 2021. Coulthard’s solo exhibition Tjuntala Ngurangka – Wattle Country shows at Alcaston Gallery, Melbourne from 23 November to 16 December, 2022. This new exhibition continues to showcase her ability to recreate the desert landscape with depth, evoking its intricate and resilient beauty.
Featured Image: Artist Nellie Ngampa Coulthard. Photo: Hansen Images. Courtesy: the artist, Iwantja Arts and Alcaston Gallery, Melbourne