'Contours' - Aboriginal Art Exhibition

23 September - 18 October 2025

Contours is a powerful exhibition of contemporary Aboriginal art from Central Australia, offering a profound reinterpretation of the landscape and its enduring spiritual, cultural, and ancestral significance. Featuring works by Aboriginal artists deeply connected to their country, the exhibition transcends Western notions of topography and geography, revealing instead a lived land that breathes with memory, ceremony, and identity.

The title Contours evokes more than the physical geography and topography on a map, it symbolizes the deep layers of connection between Aboriginal people and their traditional homelands. These artworks trace the emotional, cultural, and spiritual contours of place, as well as the unseen pathways of ancestral journeys and traditional knowledge systems that continue to guide Aboriginal life.

The exhibition features artists from Australia's Central Desert regions who have employed vibrant colours, symbolic iconography, and a variety of painting techniques to depict sites of significance and important cultural stories.

These works invite viewers to see Country not as a passive backdrop, but as a living presence imbued with ancestral authority.

Artists featured include Eileen Napaltjarri, George Hairbrush Tjungurrayi, George Ward Tjungurrayi, Kudditji Kngwarreye, Makinti Napanangka, Ronnie Tjampitjinpa, Walangkura Napanangka and Willy Tjungurrayi. 

At its core, Contours challenges colonial cartographies and asserts Indigenous ways of seeing, understanding and interpreting the land.

VIEW EXHIBITION CATALOGUE