Finalist ‘Naked & Nude Art Prize 2021’

The Manning Regional Art Gallery in Taree hosts the biennial ‘Naked & Nude Art Prize’. Having been a previous finalist in 2019, I was delighted to also be a finalist this year. My work ‘Nexus’ was selected to be among the 62 finalists selected for this years award. The judge this year was artist Wendy Sharpe.

This work is named ‘Nexus’ from the Latin meaning ‘that which binds together’. It speaks of the emotion and deep connection we feel when we wade out into the ocean and feel it flow around us. We have these same feelings too when we are in the bush, the desert - anywhere we can be immersed in the natural environment.

It is unsurprising that the English language has few words for this ‘connection’ to the natural world given the rationalistic and materialistic priorities of western thought. We are blessed that Australia’s first Nations people always maintained a different perspective.

In the Ngan'gikurunggurr language of the First Nations people of the Daly River in the Northern Territory there is a word and a quality - ‘dadirri’. Senior Australian of the year and member of the Ngangiwumirr language group, Dr Miriam-Rose Ungunmerr tells us, “It is inner, deep listening and quiet, still awareness… Dadirri recognises the deep spring that is inside us. We call on it and it calls to us. This is the gift that Australia is thirsting for.”

As we come together - people, environment and country, these words guide us.