Shane Pickett
Food Gathering Grounds of Bunuroo After the Sunset
about the artwork
For the Noongar Peoples this celebrated and internationally acclaimed artist embodies the concepts of the past, present and future. Chosen specifically to represent Noongar culture at Chevron Australia’s headquarters, there is without a doubt no equal.
Steeped in his traditional culture, ever-present during his innovative career as a contemporary artist, the works of the late Shane Pickett continue to offer an inspiring legacy to future generations.
This painting represents one of the Noongar six seasons, the Noongar season of Bunuroo, between February and March is the hottest time of the year with little to no rain. If you’re close to the coast, hot easternly winds continue with a cooling sea breeze most afternoons. Traditionally this was, and still is, a great time for living and fishing by the coast, rivers and estuaries.
The focus of this work captures this location perfectly, as we look west to the expanse of the Indian Ocean and east to the Swan River, and celebrate and share the bounty of place and life.
artist statement
about the artist
Shane Pickett
Whadjuk Noongar Peoples
Born Quairading, Western Australia
1957 — 2010
Born on Balardong Country in the southwest of Western Australia, Shane Pickett is one of the foremost Noongar artists of his generation. Combining his deep knowledge and concern for Noongar culture with a confident and individual style of gestural abstraction, Pickett’s paintings resonated with a profound but subtle immediacy. Balancing innovation with tradition, and modernity with ancient spirituality, they are complex visual metaphors for the persistence of Noongar culture against the colonising tide of modernity.
Pickett has been selected as a finalist in several major art prizes including the Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Award, Darwin. In 2006, he was awarded first prize at the Sunshine Coast Art Prize, Caloundra and Joondalup Invitation Art Award, Perth. In 2007, Pickett was awarded another first prize in the inaugural national Drawing Together Art Award founded in commemoration of Aboriginal Reconciliation of 1967.
The artist has been exhibited in every State and Territory in Australia and is represented in significant Australian private and major public collections.
