Doreen Chapman and Maggie Green: The Power of the Fearless Brush
In 2015, the then-manager of the recently opened Spinifex Hill Studio, Greg Taylor, praised the ‘hot palettes’ and ‘bold patterns’ increasingly favoured by the artist collective. He surmised that, for the Studio’s less experienced artists, this trend was influenced by observing the ‘electrifying elements of play’ i in the practices of more established contemporaries, such as senior Manyjiljarra artists Nyanjilpayi Nancy Chapman and Maywokka Chapman.
In particular, Taylor commented on ‘the idea of the fearless brush’ becoming evident throughout the group: an approach that, nearly ten years on, has marked out Spinifex Hill Studio as a centre for some of the most exciting and vibrant contemporary art in Western Australia.
The ‘fearless brush’ is certainly on display in these two latest exhibitions at the Studio’s project space: a pairing of the distinctive work of Spinifex Hill stalwarts, Manyjilyjarra artist Doreen Chapman, and Mangala artist Maggie Green.
With the canvases collected in Doreen, Doreen Chapman shows how her idiosyncratic and humorous aesthetic has made her one of the Studio’s most popular and collectable artists. Born in the Martu community of Jigalong, Chapman has spent her life moving between Western Desert communities, growing up around senior artists, including her mother, fellow artist Maywokka Chapman. Despite being deaf and non-verbal, the younger Chapman is an energetically expressive individual, whose prolific art practice has become an essential extension of her communication.
Maywokka Chapman shares her daughter’s life story, and describes how, early on, the then-apprentice artist had established her resolute and rapid painting habits:
Been born Jigalong. Big sister for my son, Dennis Thomas. [S]he been come this way, Hedland. Doreen, [and] me, [are] from Karntimarta, Warralong. I been bring him [her] here. Little girl [s]he start painting, in Warralong. [S]he looking… looking… [s]he quick painter, quickly, looking, looking. No fishing, no hunting, no car, painting, painting every day eh? You been bring ‘em, [s]he painting, painting, painting! [laughs]ii
Doreen Chapman’s work continues the Martu legacy of storytelling, using a unique creative voice. Her playful and observational style translates into captivating and unexpected vignettes: witness her helicopters, buses and planes, traversing sceneries of cobalt, ochre and indigo; creatures and vegetation— towering boabs, corkscrew snakes and even a dayglo prawn, for example—given startling shapes and character; and figures accessorised by striking headgear. Current Studio manager Faraday Boydell notes that Chapman, ‘who is extremely friendly, cheeky, helpful around the Studio, and loves working
4 Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station
with the team here’iii likes to reference a mood board of printed images of everyday phenomena like vehicles and animals and plants, which she then refracts through her unique artistic perspective into arresting canvases. Her paintings often zero in on a specific visual detail, in order to amplify that singularity in a droll and assertive manner, and invite us to appreciate the extraordinary in the ordinary.
The world as viewed by Chapman is full of pace, gesture, drama, and also what can only be described as a deep tenderness. A mama duck leads her neatly ordered family of bronze-coloured ducklings across a lilac background. A bird’s eye view of a turtle’s yellow-tiled shell presents a perspective that is at once vivid and vulnerable. In Doreen
are gathered the works of a talented, unique and deeply affecting artist; and living with a ‘Doreen painting’ means being privileged to live with art of immense warmth, vitality and charm.
While Chapman’s work is inspired by contemporary imagery and objects, Maggie Green’s subject matter is sustained by acute and graphic childhood recollections. The Kimberley-born artist grew up at Myroodah Station near Derby, on the traditional lands of the Nyikina Mangala people. The years Green spent with her family hunting, cooking, working and playing on the station are deeply inscribed, not only into her memory, but also into her art.
https://artedit.com.au/artist-profile-doreen-chapman/
5 Doreen.
‘From the Spinifex Hill Studios’ by Greg Taylor. We Call It Home catalogue, 2015. FORM and Spinifex Hill Studio. ii Courtesy of Maywokka Chapman and Spinifex Hill Studio.
iii Faraday Boydell quoted by Charlotte Middleton, 2021
Artist Doreen Chapman with the camel.
Photograph by Sophia Constantine, courtesy of Spinifex Hill Studio.
In My Young Days at Myroodah, Green’s elegant and meticulous dot paintings detail the intimate knowledge of a topography she has carried since toddlerhood: the dam she frequented for fishing and swimming, the secret places where she hunted for bush tucker. As her exhibition pieces show, her technique is fastidious and exact, delineating an expansive lived experience within the dimensions of a single canvas. Her aerial landscapes constitute specific
landmarks from the station, depicted in pixelated blocks of colour, small rectangles within larger ones in carefully dotted pastel and primary shades. These intriguing colourways and juxtapositions of boundaries appear like a schematic layout: diagrammatic representations of where Green roamed as a child. The artist takes pride and pleasure in recounting the experiences of her formative years:
6 Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station
Artist Maggie Green painting at Spinifex Hill Studio, photo by AB Videography, 2023.
[I was] born on station, Myroodah Station, Derby side. My mother and father, granddad, grandmother, uncles, aunties, we all been grew up there. I been going to school there. Working in the house, cooking, go for hunting. [My family] always took us out for bush tucker, fishing. Me and my mum we been cooking for station owner Charles Lanigan, and Mary, his daughter. Always work on the station; clean up, cooking, washing. Everybody got to get up early, go to school there. That’s my home. We all been there, we get big there. Get all the eggs from the chickens, milk the nanny goat, mop the floor, make bed, wash all the sheets.iv
When Green started painting with the Spinifex Hill collective in 2010 (four years before the artists moved into the custombuilt Studio), she worked predominantly in pastels. Now, however, Green is experimenting with a darker, more definite palette. Her works incorporate vivid shades of plum, turquoise, magenta and sage; deep blues and purples juxtaposed with candy hues of vanilla, citrus and toffee. Boydell elaborates on this exciting development in Green’s practice, observing that although the artist’s subject matter and dedication to her personal story is the same, Green is now layering her paints
‘in a more complex way, and her colours are richer, with much more subtle variations in tone and hue.’ In support of this new direction, Boydell says, the Studio ‘has also incorporated matte and gloss mediums into her paints this time, so that there is variation in texture and finish within each painting. Small, subtle additions that add a new force to her work.’ v
Green’s aesthetic is stippled, studied and precise: dense geometric shapes built up with a stick dotting technique, thickly layered and intersecting across the canvas, occasionally punctuated by neat depictions of gum trees. For the viewer, these are renditions of place and Country which appear to withhold as much as they reveal; holding in tension the specific with the abstract, to satisfying effect.
Such contrasting styles with these two exhibitions: Doreen Chapman’s ‘hot palettes,’ and exuberant brushwork, Maggie Green’s elegant shapes and ‘bold patterns.’ The work of both these artists exemplifies what author and art critic Susan McCulloch OAM described in 2015 as the ‘inspirational optimism [of the Studio]… as well as an urgency to create … to express oneself artistically in ways that both reinforce culture and take it to the world at large.’ vi
The artworks in Doreen and in Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station: truly the power of the fearless brush.
Mags Webster FORM writer
7 Doreen.
iv Courtesy of Maggie Green and Spinifex Hill Studio
v Faraday Boydell, email correspondence with author, 2023.
vi ‘Spinifex Hill Studio: Contemporary Aboriginal Art of the Pilbara’ by Susan McCulloch OAM. We Call It Home catalogue, 2015. FORM and Spinifex Hill Studio.
Maggie Green
[I was] born on station, Myroodah Station, Derby side. My mother and father, granddad, grandmother, uncles, aunties, we all been grew up there. I been going to school there. Working in the house, cooking, go for hunting. [My family] always take us out for bush tucker, fishing.
Me and my mum we been cooking for station owner, Charles Lanigan. Mary his daughter. Always work on the station, clean up, cooking, washing. Everybody got to get up early, go to school there.
That’s my home. We all been there, we get big there. Get all the eggs from the chickens, milk the nanny goat, mop the floor, make bed, wash all the sheets.
We didn’t go to Derby school. Mr Lanigan said you go to school here. Going mustering my dad, my mum did the cooking. Mr Lanigan always take us to Derby for shopping, then take us back to Myroodah station, Martu station. Family all in Looma, all the Greens. Big mob us Greens.
8 Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station
Maggie paints about her childhood: the station where she grew up, went to school, and worked, the dam she visited for fishing and swimming, and the bush tucker she collected. Her mother is frequently referred to in the stories associated with her artwork, as are then Myroodah Station Manager Mick, and teacher Mary, Lanigan. Maggie also fondly remembers the friends she grew up with on the station, with whom she would ‘run amok.’
Awards
2019 – Cossack Art Awards, Best Painting by a Pilbara Indigenous Artist
2016 – Cossack Art Awards, Best Painting by an Indigenous Artist
2014 – Hedland Art Awards, Kathy Donnelly
Judges’ Award
9 Doreen.
Artist Maggie Green painting at Spinifex Hill Studio, photo by AB Videography, 2023.
10 Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station
Maggie Green Kunmunya, Myroodah Station, 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
71 x 71 cm 23-293
$1544
Maggie Green
Kunmunya, Myroodah Station, 2022
Acrylic on Canvas 76 x 40.5 cm 22-612
$1,169
Kunmunya, Myroodah Station, 2022
Acrylic on Canvas 76 x 40.5 cm 22-643
$1,169
12 Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station
Maggie Green
Acrylic on Canvas
71 x 101.5 cm
22-727
$2,406
13 Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station
Maggie Green Kunmunya, Myroodah Station, 2022
Gum
otherwise known as Sugar Bag, 2023
23-227
$1,169
14 Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station
Maggie Green
Tree and Kuntal (Edible botanical gum
Acrylic on Canvas
61 x 61 cm
15 Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station
Maggie Green
Gum Tree and Kuntal (Edible botanical gum
otherwise known as Sugar Bag, 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
45.5 x 76 cm 23-191
$1,169
16 Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station
Maggie Green
Kunmunya, Myroodah Station,, 2021
Acrylic on Canvas
91.5 x 91.5 cm
21-1105
$2,994
Maggie Green
Kunmunya, Myroodah Station, 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
40.5 x 76 cm
23-328
$988
Maggie Green
Kunmunya, Myroodah Station, 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
40.5 x 76 cm
23-349
$988
17 Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station
18 Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station
Maggie Green Kunmunya, Myroodah Station, 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
30.5 x 51 cm 23-11
$469
Maggie Green Kunmunya, Myroodah Station, 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
30.5 x 51 cm 23-20
$469
19 Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station
Maggie Green
Kunmunya, Myroodah Station, 2022
Acrylic on Canvas
45.5 x 71 cm
22-604
$1,169
Kunmunya, Myroodah Station, 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
71 x 101.5 cm 23-78
$2,406
Kunmunya, Myroodah Station, 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
71 x 101.5 cm 23-79
$2,406
20 Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station
Maggie Green
Maggie Green
Maggie Green
Kunmunya, Myroodah Station, 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
76 x 101.5 cm
23-726
$2,425
Maggie Green
Kunmunya, Myroodah Station, 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
76 x 101.5 cm
23-44
$2,425
21 Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station
Maggie Green
Kunmunya, Myroodah Station, 2022
Acrylic on Canvas
51 x 51 cm
22-464
$813
Maggie Green
Kunmunya, Myroodah Station, 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
51 x 61 cm
23-268
$906
Maggie Green Untitled, 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
61 x 61 cm
23-240
$1,169
22 Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station
Acrylic on Canvas
76 x 91.5 cm
23-257
$2,406
Acrylic on Canvas 76 x 101.5 cm
23-336
$2,425
23 Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station
Maggie Green
Kunmunya, Myroodah Station, 2023
Maggie Green
Kunmunya, Myroodah Station, 2023
Acrylic on Canvas 122 x 122 cm
23-236
$4,700
25 Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station
Maggie Green
Kunmunya, Myroodah Station, 2023
Doreen Chapman
Been born Jigalong. Big sister for my son, Dennis Thomas. [S]he been come this way, Hedland. Doreen, [and] me, [are] from Karntimarta, Warralong. I been bring him [her] here. Little girl [s]he start painting, in Warralong. [S]he looking… looking… [s]he quick painter, quickly, looking, looking. No fishing, no hunting, no car, painting, painting every day eh? You been bring ‘em, [s]he painting, painting, painting!
as told by Maywokka May Chapman, Doreen’s mother.
26 Doreen.
Artist Doreen Chapman at Spinifex Hill Studio, photo by AB Videography, 2023.
Doreen was born in Jigalong in 1971 and has spent her life moving between Western Desert communities in the Pilbara, Western Australia. She is a Manyjilyjarra artist and has spent most of her adult life in Warralong, a community 120km southeast of Port Hedland. She started painting with her mother, Maywokka May Chapman, and she first exhibited with Martumili artists in 2010. In recent years she has spent more time in Port Hedland and began painting at Spinifex Hill Studios.
Awards
2021 – Cossack Art Awards, Best Painting by an Indigenous Artist
2021 – National Capital Art Prize (finalist)
2020 – Lester Prize for Portraiture (finalist)
2019 – Perth Royal Art Prize, Highly Commended
2019 – Lester Prize for Portraiture (finalist)
2017 – Hedland Art Awards Best Painting by an Indigenous Artist
2017 – Cossack Art Award Best Painting by a Pilbara Artist
2016 – Cossack Art Prize Best Painting by an Indigenous Artist
2016 – Hedland Art Awards Kathy Donnelly Judges Award
2015 – Cossack Art Prize Best Painting by an Indigenous Artist
27 Doreen.
Artist Doreen Chapman painting at Spinifex Hill Studio, photo by AB Videography, 2023.
28 Doreen.
Doreen Chapman Untitled, 2021 Acrylic on Canvas 91.5 x 91.5 cm 21-542
$2,275
30 Doreen.
Doreen Chapman Bus, 2023
Acrylic on Canvas 76 x 122 cm 23-45 $2,444
Doreen Chapman
Untitled, 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
56 x 56 cm
23-154
$688
Doreen Chapman
Untitled (Plane), 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
51 x 71 cm
23-225
$888
31 Doreen.
32 Doreen.
Doreen Chapman
Untitled, 2020 Acrylic on Canvas
45.5 x 183 cm
20-822
$2,919
33 Doreen.
Doreen Chapman
Untitled, 2020 Acrylic on Canvas
45.5 x 183 cm
20-810
$2,919
Doreen Chapman
Untitled, 2019
Acrylic on Canvas
76 x 76 cm
19-219
$1,088
Doreen Chapman
Untitled (Cheeky Dog), 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
61 x 61 cm
23-100
$888
34 Doreen.
Untitled (Turtle), 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
56 x 56 cm
23-177
$688
Untitled (Snake), 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
35.5 x 40.5 cm
23-144
$288
35 Doreen.
Doreen Chapman
Doreen Chapman
Doreen Chapman
Untitled, 2019
Acrylic on Canvas
76 x 76 cm
19-177
$1,088
Doreen Chapman
Untitled, 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
45.5 x 40.5 cm
23-141
$425
36 Doreen.
Untitled
Untitled
23-103
$488
37 Doreen.
Doreen Chapman
(Woman with Hat), 2023
Acrylic on Canvas 51 x 71 cm
23-102
$888
Doreen Chapman
(Man with Hat), 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
40.5 x 56 cm
38 Doreen.
Doreen Chapman
Untitled (Duck Family), 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
40.5 x 91.5 cm
23-172
$750
39 Doreen.
Doreen Chapman
Untitled (Helicopter), 2023
Acrylic on Canvas 45.5 x 40.5 cm
23-146
$425
Doreen Chapman Untitled, 2023
Acrylic on Canvas 56 x 56 cm
23-217
$688
40 Doreen.
Doreen Chapman
Untitled, 2020
Acrylic on Canvas
71 x 101.5 cm
20-360
$1,831
41 Doreen.
Doreen Chapman
Untitled, 2020
Acrylic on Canvas 71 x 101.5 cm 20-537
$1,831
42 Doreen.
Doreen Chapman
Untitled (Prawn), 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
71 x 61 cm 23-213
$1,038
Untitled (Duck), 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
51 x 101.5 cm
23-211
$1,213
Untitled (Boabs), 2023
Acrylic on Canvas
45.5 x 76 cm
23-219
$888
43 Doreen.
Doreen Chapman
Doreen Chapman
FORM Building a State of Creativity and Spinifex Hill Studio
For nearly two decades, cultural organisation FORM Building a State of Creativity has worked to support the creative community of Western Australia’s remote Pilbara region. In 2008, realising there was no established support for Aboriginal artists living in the Hedland area, FORM starting providing materials, art sessions and mentoring opportunities specifically so that local artists could paint together and develop their practices. This group of artists were the foundation of the collective that now paints at Spinifex Hill Studio, one of Australia’s most dynamic art centres, and the only Aboriginal art collective in the wider Hedland area.
In 2014, with the support of Principal Partner BHP, FORM established the Studio’s permanent home in South Hedland. This is essentially FORM’s base in the Pilbara, and the Studio’s Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal support and management personnel are part of the FORM team. From Monday to Friday the Studio opens to facilitate the practices of a core group of around twenty artists daily, however around a hundred artists are associated with the Studio and will paint there when in town. With a focus on acrylic painting, artists are given professional support in the preparation, creation and documentation of artwork. They are also given transport to and from the studio, lunch, and the opportunity to work with studio staff in refining their paintings for exhibitions, awards, markets and other professional opportunities.
Artists regularly participate in major national exhibitions and events, and are represented in national collections including the Janet Holmes à Court Collection, the Art Gallery of South Australia, The Art Gallery of Western Australia, Curtin University, Flinders University Art Museum, the Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory, and the Western Australian Museum.
The aim has been to make the Studio a safe, holistic and dynamic environment for artists, and it has grown into an important cultural and community place for South Hedland and the wider Pilbara region. It is unique in Australia as an urban-based art centre representing Aboriginal artists from numerous cultural backgrounds and language groups; there is no dominant ‘house style,’ rather the Studio supports an eclectic range of art practices in recognition of the diversity of Indigenous experience.
Many artists have been able to build esteem and pride through their art making, gain confidence to share stories in a culturally appropriate way, travel outside their home region to attend exhibitions and art fairs, and create new income streams for themselves and their families.
Most importantly, the Studio has supported the artists in articulating their culture to audiences around Australia and the world, helping build the reputation of the Pilbara as a dynamic cultural and artistic artmaking region.
44 Maggie: My Young Days at Myroodah Station
Spinifex Hill Studio is an initiative of FORM Building a State of Creativity. The Studio is supported by its Principal Partner BHP, and by the Federal Government’s Indigenous Visual Arts Industry Support (IVAIS) program. Spinifex Hill Project Space was constructed thanks to support from BHP, Major Supporter Lotterywest, and Project Supporter the Pilbara Development Commission through the Regional Economic Development (RED) Grant Program. FORM is supported by the Department for Local Government, Sport and Cultural Industries Arts Organisation Investment program, and is assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council.
©2023. All rights reserved.
Copyright for photographic images is held by FORM. Copyright for written content is held by FORM or the individual writers.
Spinifex Hill Studio
18 Hedditch Street, South Hedland WA 6722 +61 8 9172 1699
mail@spinifexhillstudio.com.au @spinifexhillartists www.spinifexhillstudio.com.au
FORM Building a State of Creativity
39 Gugeri Street, Claremont, WA 6010 +61 8 9385 2200
mail@form.net.au @formwa www.form.net.au
FORM is a registered trademark owned by FORM Building a State of Creativity Inc.
45 Doreen.
46 Doreen.
Exhibition Curated and Managed By Principal Partner
Government Partners
