The Batchelor Institute Art Collection is a significant cultural entity comprising around 1000 artworks from First Nations artists Australia-wide though predominantly from the NT. The collection also contains some work from Papua New Guinea and by non-Indigenous Australian artists affiliated with the Institute or with Indigenous Australian art per se.
Begun in the 1980s with the donation of artworks from students and friends of (then) Batchelor College, the Collection was initially conceived as a way to make the campus environment more familiar to students with artwork reflective of their familial and homeland ties. This was followed by a concerted acquisition program which was significantly bolstered by the Institute’s artist-in-residence and master artist-in-residence programs and the establishment of the Coomalie Cultural Centre as an exhibition venue. Key Institute staff involved in the Collection’s development include David McKay, Pat Torres, Joanna Barrkman and Leanne Mahaffey, among others. By 2007, the Collection’s first (part-time) curator, Gary Lee, was appointed, followed by Steve Anderson (2008-2019) and Maurice O’Riordan (2022-present).
The Institute Art Collection is home to the work of many leading lights of Indigenous Australian art over the past five decades including Gulumbu Yunupingu, Paddy Fordham Wainburranga, Wenten Rubuntja, Gertie Huddleston, Ricky Maynard, Ian Abdullah, Mary Kunyi, Kieren Karritpul and Naminapu Maymuru-White, to mention but a few. Their work exists alongside that of lesser-known artists including outstanding work by students of the Institute’s visual art programs.
Mary Kanyi (Kanngi) (1925 - 2005)
Ngangikurrungkurr / subsection/clan: Nangarri
Black Plum Tree, 1994, acrylic on canvas, 90cm(h) x 83cm(w)
BAC: 03156
© the estate of Mary Kanyi / Merrepen Arts, Nauiyu
Acquired from artist-in-residence program, Batchelor campus, August 1994
The Collection has a number of works by Mary Kanyi, some of which were included in the retrospective solo exhibition The Mary Kunyi Legacy, Godinmayin Yijard Rivers Arts and Culture Centre, Katherine, 5 April to 13 July 2019, curated by Dr Cathy Laudenbach, Merrepen Arts.
