"We didn’t have any tents — we lived in shelters made of grass. When it was raining the grass was roughly thrown together for shelter. That was in the olden time, a long time ago."
Emily Kam Kngwarray is without a doubt the most famous female Aboriginal artist to date. She may be considered one of the greatest contemporary Australian artists and her influence on the world of both indigenous and non-indigenous Australian art is indisputably great.
Having started at nearly eighty years old, her painting career lasted a mere seven years. One of her most remarkable attributes was her capacity to develop new styles. Yet her vast output was a result of her enormous physical and mental energy, as well as her forceful personality and deep love for her ancestral country. Most of her work can be distinguished by an exceptionally wide palette of bright colors; of special significance are her more minimalist abstract works of two colors, inspired by traditional body painting.
During the last two years of her life, she broke with her bright color schemes by making minimalist “line” paintings in black, brown or blue on a white background, inspired by women’s ceremonial body painting. This led to her "Wild Yam Dreamings” ; layers of intricately crossing lines that represent the roots of the Yam plant, an edible and spiritually significant indigenous vegetable. From this period, comes her most important masterpiece, Big Yam Dreaming (1995), which was donated to the National Gallery of Victoria.