FOR the past three weeks, a Melbourne gallery has been proudly displaying the work of First Nations artist Richard Young.
The display, titled Wealthy Wurruk, Wealthy People, is a collection of abstract landscape paintings by Mr Young, who hails from Gippsland and is of Gunnai, Yorta Yorta and Gunditjmara heritage.
According to Mr Young, his exhibition has been so titled for viewers to reconsider how they perceive richness, noting that Wurruk is the Gunnai word for Country.
“We say in Aboriginal mob… that we come from the land, so we’re created out of the land,” Mr Young said.
“And our land in Gippsland… when you look at it from the snow all the way down to the big sand dunes, down far-east Gippsland to the Lakes, to the rivers and to the sea, and then all the bush, the caves et cetera; when I look at that, our land is wealthy.
“If we are from the land, therefore as a people, in my DNA, the minerals within me (are) wealth.
“Physically, I’m a wealthy, mineralised individual that comes from the land.”
Hosting the exhibition is Metro Gallery, based in the inner-city suburb of Armadale.
Mr Young came to the attention of the venue through a previous series of works at Sale’s Gippsland Art Gallery, and Metro’s art advisor, Ken McGregor.
Metro Gallery manager Dr Eugene Barilo von Reisberg said that he “jumped at the opportunity” to host Mr Young’s works.
“When I visited Richard’s studio, I was first all inspired by the beauty of the works,” Dr Barilo von Reisberg explained.
“I was inspired by Richard’s genuine passion for what he does, and by the most genuine connection between the artist and the land… because everything that Richard does talks about the intimate connection that he has with the land, not only personally, but also through generations and generations of his ancestors, through a timeline which is beyond our comprehension.”
Photo: Contributed
In addition to telling his story, Mr Young’s paintings challenge the conventions of Indigenous Australian art, a deliberate choice of his.
In his yarn with the Gippsland Times, Mr Young bemoaned what he described as the “appropriation” of dot-style painting – a technique common in Central Australia, but rarely practised elsewhere.
“Even still to this day, you look at the AFL, NRL, all the sporting codes with all their (Indigenous) jerseys – they all depict motifs and symbolisms and styles that reinforce one type of Aboriginal art as the only Aboriginal art,” Mr Young said.
“So when fellas adopt, if you like, (dot painting) as their artistic narrative to validate their connection to their Country… that’s just an example of who’s telling our story and who’s validating our story within the art world.
“I don’t try to create or to make up my creation story, or my connection to Country story, by using those symbols because it’s not true for me.
“That’s not telling these fellas down here (in Victoria) or anywhere else that what they’re doing is wrong – that’s for them to work out for themselves.
“All I know is, we’ve got our markings. My Country is different to desert Country – we don’t have their certain dreaming down here… that’s their Country.”
As for his artistic process, Mr Young revealed that he never knows beforehand what he’s going to paint.
“I don’t plan, ’cause if I plan, I stuff it up,” he said.
“I just feel whatever the vibrations are from Country, whatever comes into my head, whatever colours jumped out at me – that’s all I do.”
Wealthy Wurruk, Wealthy People will be on display at Metro Gallery until this Saturday, October 8.
For more information, visit www.metrogallery.com.au
