G A R M A    F E S T I V A L   A N D   G A P A N   G A L L E R Y

The Gapan Gallery at the Garma Festival is the print space's big event of the year - it's an annual event and the festival attracts about 2000 visitors each year- you can read more about it here - http://www.yyf.com.au

For the art centre is a very important weekend not only to generate sales but also to generate interest and contacts and have a bit of fun while camping.  The Gapan Gallery is an outdoor gallery that nestles itself just off site in a circle of stringybark trees,. We paint the tree trunks white with gapan (the white cay used for bark painting, and ceremonial body painting) we hang lights and the framed prints and we spread white sand to create a white gallery space , its magical. 

on opening night the ladies cry up the land in the darkness as everyone sits in the sand and then the lights come on and boom! 

The set up of the gaan gallery takes a bit of time but thats why we have Aimee and her clipboard - she is very organised and runs the show with impressive style and grace ... 

this is the day the sand arrived after we weeded the area

then Aimee arrived with her clipboard

we painted the trees white

 Godut, Paula and me

the finished result 

this year for something different we were coerced into doing a talk - a presentation of the printspace and the prints-  we did do pretty well considering ALL of us loathe public speaking - I look alright with a microphone ! not

you can read a bit more here http://www.yyf.com.au/news/detail.aspx?SubjectID=1&ArticleID=34 

we had some help from Denise Salvestro a great women doing her Phd on the 

print space -  most useful!

crowd

the shy Bawu speaks about her print

and Burrthi about his - he looks good with a microphone! 

the festival opened Friday 1st August and ran until Tuesday - 

after the pack down we packed our bags and flew to Darwin for the

Art Fair, Art Awards and another full-on intense week but

more on that later ...

The biggest thing this year - on a professional front at least  - has been the employment of 5 new young staff members at the Print Space - as the year began they slowly started trickling in one by one until I had SIX people employed ... aside from Paula Gumana who began work last year they are all aged 19 and 20 and have been in the art centre over the years involved in some of the workshops held for youth - especially those disengaged with mainstream schooling  ...
so it keeps me real busy trying to teach and train and inspire and motivate 5 young people on a daily basis but it also keeps me very entertained as they show and share their perspective with me .... I have had to listen to a lot of crappy pop music (think justin beiber!) but its been an amazing year watching them kick some incredible goals and I have been shown up on numerous occasions by assuming incorrectly that their age is some sort of hindrance to their brilliance ...

Munuy'ngu, Burrthi, Paula, Godut and Dhalmula

Munuy'ngu, Bawu and Burrthi

Godut, Munuy'ngu and Bawu

In the printspace

Munuy'ngu and Paula

Burrthi and Bawu

Here's a couple of the prints they have made and edtioned themselves this year.
Burrthi's print below of the purple Octopus was selected as part of the National Telstra Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Awards.  (his link here)
Dhalmula's print 'Bunggul' was selected for the tote bag design for Cotton On Foundation NADOIC Week.
Paula and Munuy'ngu's print was used as Garma Festival merchandise and Munuy'ngu's also on exhibition at Salon des Refuses in Darwin.

Munuy'ngu Marika' Dapirrk Girri'

Godut Ganambarr 'BasketShell' 

Burthi Marika 'Ngarrpiya'

Dhalmula with her tote bag from Cotton On Foundation

We got to celebrate Godut's graduation from Year 12 as well - she is one of only TWO graduates for 2013, its huge achievement. She has a gentle nature but also obviously a determination and it was a wonderful thing to be involved. She looked beautiful 

so thats where I have been all year - next blog will be all about garma, darwin, the art awards and sunrise, sometime hopefully sooner rather than later ...

OK ! yes, its been awhile - apologies  ... I have a variety of excuses but whatever, its now August and last time I blogged was MARCH so needless to say a lot has happened in between - heres a little catch up photo montage to catch up on the last 4 months with some more coming soon, really soon!

In MAY we went to the Gold Coast and Brisbane where we stayed with the whole NZ Whanau for my dad's 70th - we had a great week of swimming (for the brave) tennis (got competitive) food, eating laughing and some bush walking in the rain ....

Iggy turned 5 

On the weekend of 5th June we drove a small 12 hours to go to the Burunga Festival - it seems a crazy idea now but at the time seemed perfectly logical to drive so far for three days - it was worth though - we camped, watched bands, ate food, milled around and had a small mini break ...

Sailor and an ant hill...

in the billing (no crocs!)

festival outfits...?

and what else ..?

swim at goanna lagoon ... and eggs from our 4 chickens, fluffy, pixel, parma and bowl ...