Saturday, 15 November 2008 until Friday, 23 January 2009

True North

Linocuts and etchings by indigenous artists from Australia's "Top End"

Open House:              11:00 am – 6:00 pm

                                  Saturday, 15 November 2008

                                  3:00 p.m. gallery talk by master
                                  printer Dan Mitchell Allison

"True North" features contemporary art prints from Australia's northern coast and islands, the so-called Top End, and includes works by artists from the Torres Strait Islands, Arnhem Land, and Tiwi Islands.

The show includes works by three of the Torres Strait Islanders featured in the museum exhibition, Dennis Nona, Alick Tipoti, and David Bosun. The gallery is also showing works by printmakers from Arnhem Land and the Tiwi Islands. Australia's Top End is much closer to Indonesia and Papua New Guinea than to Sydney, and the Aboriginal people from this region are far removed from the cultures of the continent's desert people. As a result, these prints incorporate mysterious ancestral beings and ancient ceremonies related to the sea, and reveal some of the influences from early contact with south Asian fishermen as well as European explorers and missionaries.

Artists produce original prints by carving designs into plates, which may be made of linoleum attached to wood (linocut) or metal (etching). The artist then inks the plates and rolls specially-prepared paper through a printing press to produce a limited number of artworks. Each print has subtle variations in color and intensity, and hence is an "original."

The Booker-Lowe show and sale complements the Houston Museum of Printing History's traveling exhibition, "Gelam Nguzu Kazi - Dugong My Son," which opens Tuesday, 4 November, and runs through Saturday, 20 December. Gelam Nguzu Kazi includes 33 limited edition linocuts by indigenous artists from the Torres Strait Islands, and has been shown in only three U.S. venues, before traveling to South America and Europe. The Museum is located at 1324 West Clay. For more information, please visit www.theprintmuseum.org.

Nana Booker
Honorary Consul of Australia