Women, painting with a passion to preserve their culture, are emerging as the stars of the contemporary Aboriginal art movement. The recent triumphant embrace of the Aboriginal painting movement, dominated in its early years by the creativity of Aboriginal men, has in recent decades invigorated the lives of women artists living in remote areas of Australia.

Aboriginal women have created a modern genre of painting which explores an unparalleled familiarity with the landscape, documenting women’s traditional ceremony and stories whilst at the same time highlighting the reality of life in remote Australia. Exhibitions nationally and globally have celebrated the dignity, strength and wisdom of Aboriginal women. The unequivocal enthusiastic reception of their artwork has contributed immeasurably to a broader recognition of the women’s existence at the country’s spiritual heart.

‘Mothers of Invention’ is an exhibition of paintings by six artists - some emerging and some more established- living in communities scattered across the nation. The exhibition illustrates the artistic innovative diversity present in Indigenous women’s art as they all tell similar stories relating to food, ceremony and community.

The exhibition features work by Nancy McDinny, Gladdy Kemarre, Emma Daniel Nungarayi, Pansy Hicks, Alice Guiness, and Ruby Lee Naparrula.

Since commencing painting in 2002, Nancy McDinny, from Borroloola, has successfully exhibited across Australia, with two sell-out exhibitions in 2005 and 2006. Nancy’s 2006 exhibition Making Contact resulted in several works being acquired by public collections, including the National Museum of Australia and the National Maritime Museum. Nancy been selected for numerous art prizes including the 2007 Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Award and the 2007 and 2008 Togart Award at Parliament House in Darwin.

Gladdy Kemarre, from the Utopia region in the central desert, is an artist whose work is represented in major public collections throughout the country.

Emma Daniel Nungarayi is one of the senior female Papunya artists, and sister of well known artist Paddy Carroll. She is a finalist in the 2008 Telstra award for the first time and is represented in the collection of the Art Gallery of New South Wales.

Ruby Lee Naparrula is an emerging artist from Papunya Tula Artists who has participated in several successful group exhibitions. Ruby is represented in ‘Mothers of Invention’ with a series of stark, tightly executed paintings representing body paint designs and headwear used in women’s ceremonies. In the same vein, Alice Guiness, from the Roebourne Art Group in Western Australia’s Pilbara region has painted graphically bold works based on an aspect the ancient bundut ceremony in which women participants use their feet to mark the ground with concentric circles.

Pansy Hicks, also from the Roebourne Art Group, is also a finalist in this year’s Telstra art award. Her colourful paintings of bush tucker are densely packed with symbols of a variety of specific traditional foods collected and eaten by the Nagarluma women of the Pilbara.