Alalgura-emu country

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Alalgura-emu country

Artist Emily Kame Kngwarreye (Australian, c.1910-1996)

DateJune 1990

Dimensions60 × 48 × 1 3/4 in. (152.4 × 121.9 × 4.4 cm)

MediumPolymer synthetic paint on canvas

ClassificationPaintings

Credit LinePurchased with funds from the Florence Scott Libbey Bequest in Memory of her Father, Maurice A. Scott

Object number

2016.10

On View

Toledo Museum of Art (2445 Monroe Street), Gallery, 06

DescriptionThe painting is a painterly, abstract composition with painted dots throughout the canvas including purple, green, pink, and yellow as the most prominent colors.

Label TextTo a non-Aboriginal Australian viewer, the layers of intricate dots that cover Emily Kame Kngwarreye’s Alalgura—Emu Country may seem like an arresting abstract composition, perhaps even evoking the Abstract Expressionist paintings of Jackson Pollock. However, for Kngwarreye, who was a respected ceremonial leader in her desert country of origin (Alhalker, in Australia’s Northern Territory), this organic grid is a distinct visual language with a deep symbolic cultural meaning. If you look closely, you may be able to find the meandering lines hidden under the layers of painted dots. These lines represent the spreading of roots from a yam plant, which is a staple of the desert diet. The roots are also a metaphor for the spiritual forces placed in the ground by the ancestral Emu beings, spiritual figures who represent the original form of the large, flightless birds of Australia.