Thorny Devil Lizard Dreaming - Kathleen Petyarre

The most common theme in Kathleen Petyarre's works refers to Arnkerrth, the Mountain Devil or Thorny Devil Lizard, and the Dreamings associated with this small spiky lizard believed to have created the artist's country. As the Lizard criss-crossed the vast terrain, changing colour according to its environment, it moved the sand, grain by grain throughout the history of time, creating the hills and valleys, sandhills and waterholes that are seen there today.

Kathleen was an exceptionally gifted and highly disciplined artist. She spent many hours preparing her canvas, carefully applying layer upon layer of different coloured paint that was absorbed into the linen, thereby imparting an extremely refined appearance to the finished painting. Barely visible dots sink into the work, while others are over-painted across the surface, thereby heightening the illusion of three-dimensionality.

Kathleen was a great innovator; a singularly talented artist who won the prestigious National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Award and was recognised with the rare honour of a solo retrospective exhibition at Sydney's Museum of Contemporary Art.