mudunama kundana wandaraba jarribirri: Judy Watson

mudunama kundana wandaraba jarribirri tomorrow the tree grows stronger KATINA DAVIDSON Don Watson Senior with the kids, camping at Rangers Bridge en route from Brisbane to Mount Isa 1968 Margy, Judy, Donald and Lisa Watson in the backyard at Acacia Ridge 1963 Lisa, Don Senior, Donald, Judy and Margy Watson with buffalo horns, Maryborough 1968 Grace Isaacson and Joyce Watson having a cuppa on the Seymour River, Thortonia Station 1990 OPPOSITE Waanyi Country Like the warm embrace of freshly sun-kissed sheets, visceral core memories are woven into the fabric of Judy Watson’s artistic practice. Each sweeping gesture or inky wash encapsulates her perspective as a Waanyi woman. In fact, the Waanyi, from north-west Queensland, are known as the ‘running water people’ and this precious resource is often at the heart of Watson's work, along with intergenerational family memories which have seeped into her bones. Across the media of painting, printmaking, video, sculpture, artist books, installation, and monolithic public artworks, the power of Watson’s artworks lie in their ability to share uncensored truths. They entice the viewer with layered and aesthetically compelling compositions that reveal stories of massacres and exploitation, stolen and damaged cultural heritage, environmental pollution and a feminism embodied by a lineage of strong Aboriginal women. According to the artist: Art as a vehicle for intervention and social change can be many things, it can be soft, hard, in-your-face confrontational, or subtle and discreet. I try and choose the latter approach for much of my work, a seductive beautiful exterior with a strong message like a deadly poison dart that insinuates itself into the consciousness of the viewer without them being aware of the package until it implodes and leaks its contents. 1 37 36