The exhibition begins with one of Dowling\u2019s earliest works: a metre-long self-portrait titled Is it ok to be two things at once?<\/em><\/p>\n The work, in which half her face has been painted in Badimaya cultural symbols and her ancestors depicted within the outline of her glass lens using blood, red ochre and synthetic polymer paint, expresses her identity as a Badimaya First Nation woman and offers a challenge to anyone who might doubt her heritage because of her fair skin.<\/p>\n Dowling\u2019s other paintings hit similar emotional beats, drawing upon styles of First Nation cultural symbols, Roman Catholic Renaissance art and social realism in a transformative way to educate non\u2013First Nation peoples about the Badimaya culture and how it has been sustained through colonisation.<\/p>\n Uncle Freedom <\/em>depicts a shackled Badimaya resistance fighter sent to the Aboriginal prison at Rottnest Island in the late 1800s. Icon To A Stolen Child: Teacher <\/em>depicts an elderly Badimaya woman telling her grandchildren about how she was stolen by missionaries at a young age.<\/p>\n \u201cThe church has always been around in my upbringing. My grandmother had been stolen from our Badimaya First Nation family in the Mid West in order to marry a white man and work as an unpaid slave in a convent and orphanage,\u201d Dowling says.<\/p>\n \u201cI think social realism began as a visual enquiry when I was a young girl. My mother, also an artist, would encourage my twin sister [Curtin Centre for Aboriginal Studies<\/a> researcher Carol Dowling] and I to look for other fair-skinned Badimaya people who were stolen as children.\u201d<\/p>\n The exhibition came about after AGWA Curator of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art, Carly Lane approached her to choose works that best reflected her approach to art making.<\/p>\n Dowling, who was named Australian Art Collector\u2019s most collectable artist in 2002, believes this to be one of the largest exhibitions she has ever had in Australia.<\/p>\n \u201cThe motivation for me was to show the key themes that keep occurring in my art: ending racism, protecting the human rights of First Nation people, the identity of being a fair-skinned First Nation woman and showing cultural erasure both in the past and present,\u201d Dowling says.<\/p>\n \u201cMy family and myself are iritja<\/em>: First Nation families located across the continent who act as navigators, translators, negotiators and ambassadors between communities. I now function in this same role by using my art to convey messages between the Badimaya community and the broader non\u2013First Nation world.<\/p>\n \u201cMy paintings are an act of sovereign empowerment \u2013 not only for my own identity as a Badimaya woman but for all of the hundreds of millions of First Nation peoples.\u201d<\/p>\n Julie\u2019s twin, Carol, who acknowledged the \u201ccreative and supportive partnership\u201d she has shared with her sister in an essay she wrote for the exhibition\u2019s catalogue, views the paintings with immense pride.<\/p>\n \u201cJulie\u2019s work is both subtle and confronting. The viewer is always drawn in by the glitter and juxtaposition of themes; however, once they look at the paintings, they are confronted by a deeper discourse<\/a>,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n \u201cSuch strong, beautiful and celebratory images of Aboriginal people in Australia is sorely lacking.\u201d<\/p>\n Babanyu (Friends for Life)<\/em><\/a> is on display until Monday 13 August.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A collection on display at the Art Gallery of Western Australia is celebrating the rich cultures of Australia\u2019s First Nation peoples.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4275,"featured_media":6653,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_oasis_is_in_workflow":0,"_oasis_original":0,"_oasis_task_priority":"","_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_research-areas":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"research-areas":[],"class_list":["post-6650","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorised"],"acf":{"post_options":{"":null,"additional_content":{"title":"Graduate snapshot","content":"![\"Julie](\"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/Julie-Dowling-Painting-Today.jpg\")