Angelina Pwerle was born in 1946 in Utopia, Australia – Aboriginal freehold land north east of Alice Springs. The Bush Plum Dreaming narrative is the main theme of her painting. The Dreamtime (or Dreaming) is a term used to describe the period before living memory when Spirits emerged from beneath the earth and from the sky to create the land forms and all living things. The Dreaming, besides answering questions about origins, provides a harmonious framework for human experience in the universe and the place of all living things within it. Depicting this story in her paintings is the means by which Pwerle perpetuates the past into continuity.
The Bush Plum is a native shrub found throughout the drier areas of Northern and Central Australia. Because of its significance as a food source, the Bush Plum is a totem for many Aboriginal people and has a Dreaming story associated with it. In Pwerle’s paintings, the Bush Plum is depicted as a field of minute dots or particles created with the fine point of a bamboo stick. The meticulous execution of the painting becomes a performative and meditative process. The miasma of dots creates a sense of depth that evokes topographical or cosmological imagery.
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Angelina PwerleBush Plum (1-719), 2019acrylic on linen35 7/8 x 59 1/8 in
91 x 150 cm -
Angelina PwerleBush Plum (1-911), 2011acrylic on canvas47 5/8 x 35 7/8 inches/121 x 91.1 cm
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Angelina PwerleBush plum (3-511), 2010acrylic on paper39 3/8 x 27 3/4 in
100 x 70.5 cm -
Angelina PwerleBush plum (2-616), 2016acrylic on canvas31 1/2 x 23 5/8 inches/80 x 60 cm
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Angelina PwerleBush plum (20-1010), 2010acrylic on canvas59 1/8 x 59 1/2 inches/150.2 x 151.1 cm
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Angelina PwerleBush Plum (5-518), 2018acrylic on linen47 1/4 x 35 3/8 inches/120 x 90 cm
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Angelina PwerleBush plum (29-209), 2009acrylic on linen59 1/2 x 59 7/8 inches/151.1 x 152.1 cm
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Angelina PwerleBush plum (4-516), 2016acrylic on canvas31 1/2 x 23 1/2 inches/80 x 59.8 cm
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Angelina PwerleBush plum (6-511), 2011acrylic on canvas59 1/2 x 59 1/2 inches/151.1 x 151.1 cm
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Angelina PwerleBush plum (9-1207), 2007acrylic on canvas60 1/4 x 72 1/8 inches/153 x 183.2 cm
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Angelina PwerleBush plum (13-716), 2016acrylic on linen31 1/2 x 23 5/8 in
80 x 60 cm -
Angelina PwerleBush Plum 19-416, 2016acrylic on canvas71 7/8 x 48 1/8 inches/182.6 x 122.2 cm
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Where We Are
23 Oct - 24 Nov 2021In a group exhibition marking this moment in history (and celebrating the 25th anniversary of Hosfelt Gallery) the work of 34 artists is employed to reflect on the zeitgeist of...Read more -
Angelina Pwerle
27 Jan - 10 Mar 2018Angelina Pwerle’s subtly shifting, abstract paintings come out of a history of Aboriginal art-making that is thousands of years old. Yet audiences of contemporary art will find reference points in...Read more -
20th Anniversary Exhibition
Banerjee, Campbell, Crotty, DeFeo, Hawkinson, Higgins, Kürten, Lukas, Maggi, O'Reilly, Ouadahi, Piccinini, Porter, Pwerle, Rath, Rodriguez, Schoultz, Wiley, Basquiat, Cave, Hansen, Ruscha, Sikander, and Wilke. 9 Sep - 8 Oct 2016Hosfelt Gallery celebrates its 20th anniversary with an exhibition exploring what makes an artwork significant and lasting, and the qualities that distinguish the most innovative artists of our era. This...Read more -
Angelina Pwerle
Bush Plum Dreaming 19 Oct - 7 Dec 2013This is the first U.S. exhibition of Angelina Pwerle’s subtly optical, abstract paintings. Coming out of a history of Aboriginal art-making – painting on bark, stone or the human body...Read more -
Look Both Ways
Banerjee, Campbell, Crotty, Danziger, DeFeo, Faruqee, Phungrasamee Fein, Haeckel, Hawkinson, Lukas, Maggi, O'Reilly, Ouadahi, Porter, Pwerle, Rath 8 Sep - 6 Oct 2012Hosfelt Gallery will inaugurate its new San Francisco venue with the group exhibition, Look Both Ways, opening at 260 Utah Street (at 16th Street) on September 8, 2012. Both a...Read more
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In praise of Australian Aboriginal art – ‘the oldest surviving culture in the world’
Dan F. Stapleton, Financial Times, January 28, 2022 -
‘I Like Drawings”: A Conversation with Todd Hosfelt
Justin Manley, SquareCylinder, August 5, 2019 -
Secret Maps And Sacred Landscapes: The Phillips Presents 68 Spectacular Artworks By Aboriginal Women
Jonathon Keats, Forbes, June 14, 2018 -
Abstraction review: A glorious trip through op art and minimalist mind games
Robert Nelson, The Sydney Morning Herald, March 14, 2017 -
Aboriginal Women Artists and Their Visions of Infinity
Bansie Vasvani, Hyperallergic, November 2, 2016 -
Scholl’s Women
Jeremy Eccles, Aboriginal Art Directory, September 4, 2016 -
Major touring exhibition of Australian Aboriginal art debuts at Tulane’s Newcomb Art Museum
Jose Villarreal, ArtDaily, August 21, 2016
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HG Magazine Issue no. 36
Cornelius Völker, Angelina Pwerle, Max Gimblett & William T. Wiley February 17, 2022Announcing Cornelius Völker: In the Last Light Photo Essay by Cornelius Völker Recent Press William T. Wiley: on view Max Gimblett Artist Book collection acquired...Read more -
‘I Like Drawings”: A Conversation with Todd Hosfelt
Squarecylinder August 5, 2019Drawing, as Hosfelt has envisioned it, appears to have the structure of a decentralized network, patterned through endlessly overlapping family resemblances without any single center...Read more