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Michael Nelson Jagamara

Michael Nelson Jagamara

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Michael Nelson Jagamara, (also known as Tjakamarra or Jagamarra) a senior Warlpiri artist, was born in 1946 in Pikilyi (Vaughn Springs, west of Yuendumu) and passed away in November 2020. Michael lived in Papunya in the Central Desert of Australia with his Marjory and family.

Michael is one of the most widely collected and prominent Aboriginal artists. He began painting in 1981 in Papunya. There he observed the work of older artists and by 1983 had had began to paint regularly. And decided he wanted to develop his own way of painting.

In 1984, Michael Nelson Jagamara won the inaugural National Aboriginal Art Awards (now Telstra National Indigenous Art Awards). This followed with selection for the 1986 Sydney Biennale; the Opera House Bicentenary Commission in1987 for a major canvas measuring 20 meters; The New Parliament House Forecourt Mosaic commission in Canberra in 1988; and the BMW Art Car commission in 1989. All that in his first year’s work!

In 1993, he received the Order of Australia Medal for services to Aboriginal art, and in 1994, he received the Fellowship from the Visual Arts Board of the Australia Council. In 1998 his painting career took a remarkable turn with the production of extraordinary modernist works belonging to the New Expressions series. After years of painting in a classical tradition of heavily worked canvases with dots, bands, circles and a modified palette, the painting surface suddenly exploded into a carnival of raw colour, gesture and action. These works are more than a liberation of brushstroke they are codes to a repertoire of complex ceremonial ground and body designs and dreaming stories.

When Michael Nelson Jagamara was selected for inclusion in the 3rd Asia-Pacific Triennial at QAG in 1999, Sally Butler wrote: “There is a twenty-first-century spirituality about these paintings that make the future look bright, and just a little crazy….To a certain degree, Nelson has attained the urban fantasy of having the best of both worlds.” (2000. ‘‘Michael Nelson Tjakamarra: Unmasked’. Australian Art Collector, 13: July-September 88–90.). In May 2008, he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate, University of New South Wales.

Michael Nelson Jagamara continued to makes the salient point that, whilst his choice of colours, materials and appearance are continually being reformatted, his stories have never changed! Michael was custodian of many Dreamings: Yam Dreaming, Rain and Lightning Strikes, Kangaroo, Site and Possum Love Stories, Snake-Rainbow Serpent, Flying Ant, Goanna and Sacred Sites.

Cicada Trading’s director Anne Speed will forever treasure the time, deep conversations and laughs she shared with Michael Nelson Jagamara. Vale Kumantje Jagamara.

Ultimo aggiornamento - 3-nov-2021