Long term Kimberley art centre manager Kevin Kelly will open the launch exhibition of paintings by the late East Kimberley painter Janet Dreamer (1959-2021) at Everywhen Art on February 8 with an in conversation with gallery co-director Susan McCulloch OAM.
Janet Dreamer's brilliantly coloured works bring to life the flora, wildlife and water life of her birthplace - old Flora Valley Station; the lush oasis of nearby Palm Springs and the abundant wildlife, plants and cultural significance of many places she travelled through on the numerous journeys she called 'walkabout'. Although Dreamer started painting in the late 1970s at the age of 16 and under her father's tutelage, it was more than 3 decades later - after she joined Yarliyil Arts at Halls Creek in 2013 - that she started painting in earnest and with her own vision. And what a vision it was. Her vibrantly coloured canvases with their free imagery and sizzling hues depict extraordinary and often hidden vistas of Jaru Country - from its coastal Derby region to inland reaches around Halls Creek.
A prolific painter, sadly Dreamer died in 2021. Her work was included (in posthumous tribute) in Perth's John Stringer Prize in 2002 and is also in the collection of AGWA. However, having been only marginally exhibited in her lifetime she left an extraordinary body of work.
This exhibition launches a national exhibition programme of Dreamer's works by Everywhen Art in partnership with Yarliyil Arts to accord this unique artist and her extraordinary paintings the recognition she and her work so richly deserve
KEVIN KELLY
Kevin Kelly was exhibitions manager at Museum Victoria in the 1980s and has lived in the Kimberley since 1992 as art centre manager of leading art centres and co-owner of the studio/gallery Red Rock Art. As manager of Waringarri Arts, Kununurra in the 1990s, Kelly worked closely with all the great founding Kimberley ochre artists including Paddy Jaminji, Rover Thomas, Queenie McKenzie, Jack Britten, Freddie Timms and many others and was instrumental in the establishment of Warmun Art Centre in the late 1990s.
He was subsequently the executor of the estates of Rover Thomas and Queenie McKenzie and locum manager at Warlayirti Artists, Balgo. As art centre manager of Yarliyil Art 2017-2023 he worked closely with Janet Dreamer. He is currently Advisor to Yarliyil Arts.
In 2024 The Western Australian Museum acquired Red Rock Arts' extensive collection of artefacts, written and filmed archival material and works of art - all of which documented the foundation of today's Kimberley ochre art moment. The material was described by WA Museum's CEO, Alec Coles as "one of the most significant acquisitions in the Museum’s history".
Free event but bookings requested. Click through to 'More information' to book.