Kerry Giles b. 1959

Also known as Kerry Giles, Kurwingie
  • Artist (Cartoonist / Illustrator),
  • Artist (Printmaker),
  • Artist (Textile Artist / Fashion Designer),
  • Artist ,
  • Artist (Draughtsman)
Giles worked as an artist, activist and curator. She has many accolades to her name, including the South Australian Aboriginal Artist of the Year Award in 1986 and two Artist in Residencies at Flinder's University. A retrospective of her work was held in 1997, the year of her sudden death.
You are viewing the version of bio from May 15, 2012, 1:03 p.m. (moderator approved).
Revert to this revision Go to current record

artist and activist, known to her people, the Ngarrindjeri, as “Kurwingie”, was born at Waikerie, South Australia. Her father, Stan, was an outstanding indigenous footballer, her mother apparently an Irish Australian. After attending Mitcham Girls High School in Adelaide, Kerry, aged 16, travelled to Darwin and worked at Glen Helen near Hermannsburg as a chamber-maid. There she began drawing images of Namatjira country, which she sold to guests at the hotel. She then did basketwork and associated craftwork in Darwin, until motherhood and a desire to continue her studies led her back to Adelaide in 1984. An arsonist destroyed most of her art and led her to abandon her third and final year of study for a TAFE Associate Diploma in Fabric Design. By 1986, however, she was fully engaged in art again, and in that year won the South Australian Aboriginal Artist of the Year award.

In 1988 Giles spent some time as a trainee graphic artist with Co-Media and was invited (with Mitch Dunnett junior) to be Aboriginal Artist in Residence at Flinders University, where she produced her first limited editions of works on paper and curated her first exhibition, The Cutting Edge: new art from the Third and Fourth Worlds . In 1989 she worked on a major mural project at the Port Lincoln Aboriginal Organisation. Her art incorporated material about the Aboriginal struggle for land rights, deaths in custody, exploitation of the environment, and indigenous rights. These themes were developed at Tandanya in 1989-92 when she was a trainee exhibitions’ officer. She was particularly involved in East to West: Land in Papunya Tula painting (the 1990 Adelaide Festival exhibition), and in 1991 curated Two countries, one weave , an exhibition on the work of Maningrida and Ngarrindjeri weavers. A second residency at Flinders saw Giles develop a technique of marbling on fabric. She held her first solo show at Flinders Art Gallery, ooooh! I feel Good… .

1992 saw the production of a great range of silk paintings, linocuts, screenprints and etchings. She was one of three contributors to a Contemporary Art Centre of SA exhibition, Murrundi: three River Murray stories . In 1993 she held another solo exhibition, fab ART [et al. see Megaws]

Giles died suddenly on 21 July 1997. A retrospective was held at Flinders University Art Museum in August.

Writers:
Staff Writer
Date written:
1999
Last updated:
2011

Difference between this version and previous