Mirdidingkingathi Juwarnda Sally Gabori (1924 – 11 February 2015) was an

Aboriginal Australian Aboriginal Australians are the various indigenous peoples of the Australian mainland and many of its islands, excluding the ethnically distinct people of the Torres Strait Islands. Humans first migrated to Australia 50,000 to 65,000 year ...

artist who at age 81 began painting in an abstract-like style she developed to represent her

Country A country is a distinct part of the world, such as a state, nation, or other political entity. When referring to a specific polity, the term "country" may refer to a sovereign state, state with limited recognition, constituent country, ...

, on the south side of Bentinck Island in

Queensland Queensland ( , commonly abbreviated as Qld) is a States and territories of Australia, state in northeastern Australia, and is the second-largest and third-most populous state in Australia. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Austr ...

, Australia. She represented Australia in the

55th Venice Biennale The 55th Venice Biennale was an international contemporary art exhibition held in 2013. The Venice Biennale takes place biennially in Venice, Italy. Artistic director Massimiliano Gioni curated its central exhibition, "The Encyclopedic Palace" ...

of 2013, and her works are held in the permanent collections of the Musée du Quai Branly, Paris; the

National Gallery of Australia The National Gallery of Australia (NGA), formerly the Australian National Gallery, is the national art museum of Australia as well as one of the largest art museums in Australia, holding more than 166,000 works of art. Located in Canberra in th ...

; all of the Australian state galleries, and others.

Early life

Gabori was born 1924 at Mirdidingki on the south side of Bentinck Island, the largest island in the South Wellesley Group in the southern

Gulf of Carpentaria The Gulf of Carpentaria is a sea off the northern coast of Australia. It is enclosed on three sides by northern Australia and bounded on the north by the eastern Arafura Sea, which separates Australia and New Guinea. The northern boundary ...

, Queensland. As a young woman she lived a traditional lifestyle on Bentinck Island, largely uninfluenced by Europeans. She gathered food, including

shellfish Shellfish, in colloquial and fisheries usage, are exoskeleton-bearing Aquatic animal, aquatic invertebrates used as Human food, food, including various species of Mollusca, molluscs, crustaceans, and echinoderms. Although most kinds of shellfish ...

, from the complex system of stone

fish trap A fish trap is a animal trapping, trap used for fishing, catching fish and other aquatic animals of value. Fish traps include fishing weirs, lobster trap, cage traps, fish wheels and some fishing net rigs such as fyke nets. The use of traps ar ...

s her people had built in the shallows around the island. She helped to build and maintain the stone walls of the fish traps, was an adept maker of string, and weaver of

dillybag A dillybag or dilly bag is a traditional Australian Aborigines, Australian Aboriginal bag generally woven from plant fibres. Dillybags are mainly designed and used by women to gather and transport food, and are most commonly found in the norther ...

s and coolamons, and a respected singer of

Kaiadilt The Kaiadilt are an Aboriginal Australian people of the South Wellesley group in the Gulf of Carpentaria, Queensland, Australia. They are native to Bentinck Island, but also made nomadic fishing and hunting forays to both Sweers and Allen Is ...

songs, which tell of the close ties her people had with their country. Gabori's tribal name is Mirdidingkingathi Juwarnda. Juwarnda' means "dolphin", her totemic sign, and Mirdidingkingathi means "born at Mirdidingki", in her country on the south side of Bentinck Island. The English name Gabori comes from her husband Pat Gabori, and is a corruption of his birthplace name, Kabararrjingathi. Severe drought in 1942–45 and a cyclone in 1948 made Bentinck Island uninhabitable, and

Presbyterian Presbyterianism is a historically Reformed Protestant tradition named for its form of church government by representative assemblies of elders, known as "presbyters". Though other Reformed churches are structurally similar, the word ''Pr ...

missionaries moved the entire Kaiadilt people to nearby

Mornington Island Mornington Island, also known as Kunhanhaa, is an island in the Gulf of Carpentaria in the Shire of Mornington, Queensland, Australia. It is the northernmost and, at , the largest of 22 islands that form the Wellesley Islands group. The larg ...

, the biggest island in the South Wellesley group. The

missionaries A missionary is a member of a religious group who is sent into an area in order to promote its faith or provide services to people, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care, and economic development.Thomas Hale 'On Being a Miss ...

started moving the people during the 1940s, when there were fewer than 100 Kaiadilt people living on the island. They separated the children from their parents and placed into separate

dormitories A dormitory (originated from the Latin word ''dormitorium'', often abbreviated to dorm), also known as a hall of residence, a residence hall (often abbreviated to halls), or a hostel, is a building primarily providing sleeping and residential qu ...

for boys and girls, while their parents built humpies around the mission. The final relocation in 1948 was spurred by the pollution of the islanders' water supply by seawater. A small outstation was established on Bentinck Island in 1986 and some Kaiadilt people returned. Gabori did not return with them because her husband was too frail, but was able to visit occasionally.

Career

In 2005, when she was 81, Sally and Pat Gabori were living in the Aged Person Hostel at Gununa on Mornington Island. Brett Evans had established the Mornington Island Arts and Crafts Centre to produce and market traditional crafts, including Gabori's fine weaving. She was offered paints for the first time at a workshop in April 2005. The Kaiadilt community had no two-dimensional art traditions before 2005, so Gabori had nothing to draw on but her memory of her country. When

Indigenous Australian Indigenous Australians are people with familial heritage from, or recognised membership of, the various ethnic groups living within the territory of contemporary Australia prior to History of Australia (1788–1850), British colonisation. The ...

artist Melville Escott looked at Gabori's first painting, he could identify "the river, sandbar, ripples the fish leave on the water, her brother King Alfred's country and the fish traps she used to look after". Her enthusiasm for painting grew until she was painting five days a week, every day the centre was open. Towards the end of her career, Gabori painted collaborative works with two of her daughters, and encouraged her other daughters into the art centre, to help develop a new generation of Kaiadilt painters. Over the short eight years of her painting career, she produced over 2000 paintings, and almost all major institutions in Australia acquired her works. Gabori's work has featured in over 28 solo exhibitions and been part of more than 100 group exhibitions.

Style

Her works have been described as

abstract expressionism Abstract expressionism in the United States emerged as a distinct art movement in the aftermath of World War II and gained mainstream acceptance in the 1950s, a shift from the American social realism of the 1930s influenced by the Great Depressi ...

and gestural abstraction, but art theory was not an influence on her work, since Gabori had little English. Many of her paintings represent the sea, sky and land of her country, but she is thought to be not so much engaging with an audience as engaging with her country.

Death and legacy

Gabori died on 11 February 2015."Sally Gabori (Australian, born circa 1924–2015)"

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Awards and nominations

* 2012 Winner – The 2012 Gold Award * 2012 Winner – Togart Contemporary Art Award

Major exhibitions

* 2005 ''Sally's Story'', Woolloongabba Art Gallery, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia * 2013 ''Danda ngijinda dulk, danda ngijinda malaa, danda ngad'' – ''This is my Land, this is my Sea. This is who I am''. A survey exhibition of paintings by Sally Gabori, 2005–2012, Drill Hall Gallery,

Australian National University The Australian National University (ANU) is a public university, public research university and member of the Group of Eight (Australian universities), Group of Eight, located in Canberra, the capital of Australia. Its main campus in Acton, A ...

* 2013 Personal Structures, 55th

Venice Biennale The Venice Biennale ( ; ) is an international cultural exhibition hosted annually in Venice, Italy. There are two main components of the festival, known as the Art Biennale () and the Venice Biennale of Architecture, Architecture Biennale (), ...

2013,

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, Venice * 2016 ''Dulka Warngiid'' – ''Land of All'', 21 May 2016 – 28 Aug 2016,

QAGOMA The Queensland Art Gallery and Gallery of Modern Art, colloquially known as QAGOMA, is an art museum in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. It consists of the Queensland Art Gallery (QAG), which is the main building, and a second gallery, the Gall ...

and 23 September 2016 – 29 January 2017, the

Ian Potter Centre The Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia is an art gallery that houses the Australian part of the art collection of the National Gallery of Victoria (NGV). The Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia is located at Federation Square in Melbourne, Victori ...

* 2022 ''Mirdidingkingathi Juwarnda Sally Gabori'' – July 2022 to November 2022 – Fondation Cartier pour l'Art Contemporain, France

Public collections

Art Gallery of New South Wales The Art Gallery of New South Wales (AGNSW), founded as the New South Wales Academy of Art in 1872 and known as the National Art Gallery of New South Wales between 1883 and 1958, is located in The Domain, Sydney, Australia. It is the most import ...

(3 works, ''Dibirdibi country'' 2010, 2012 , 2012'')'' *

Art Gallery of South Australia The Art Gallery of South Australia (AGSA), established as the National Gallery of South Australia in 1881, is located in Adelaide. It is the most significant visual arts museum in the Australian state of South Australia. It has a collection of ...

Art Gallery of Western Australia The Art Gallery of Western Australia (AGWA) is a public art gallery that is part of the Perth Cultural Centre, in Perth. It is located near the Western Australian Museum and State Library of Western Australia and is supported and managed by the ...

* Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tomaki (''Dibirdibi country'', ''River at King Alfred's country'' and ''Dibirdibi country'') * Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney (1 work, ''Makarrki'' 2008) * Musée du Quai Branly (''Ninjilki'' 2006) *

(7 works including ''Nyinyilki'' 2009, ''My Country'' 2009) *

National Gallery of Victoria The National Gallery of Victoria, popularly known as the NGV, is an art museum in Melbourne, Victoria (state), Victoria, Australia. Founded in 1861, it is Australia's oldest and list of most visited art museums in the world, most visited art mu ...

(11 works including ''Dibirdibi country'', and ''Rockcod story place'' * Queensland Art Gallery , Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane

References

External links

"Ancestral story and personal history overlap in Sally Gabori's art"

blog
"Visual voice of an island language"
QAGOMA blog
"Sally Gabori's Dibirdibi country"
by Bruce Mclean, 29 September 2015, QAGOMA blog {{DEFAULTSORT:Gabori, Sally 1920s births 2015 deaths Australian Aboriginal artists 21st-century Australian artists 21st-century Australian women artists Abstract expressionist artists