Tangentyere Artists – Exhibition Opening – Friday 8th June 2012
Tangentyere Artistsis a vibrant and dynamic art centre belonging to the town camp residents of Alice Springs. The studio work space is open and welcoming, providing artists a place of respite from the intensity of some Town Camps, a contemplative place to work and create and elevate.
Tangentyere Council is the major service delivery agency for 18 housing associations known as town camp communities in Alice Springs. The camps are home to around 2000 Indigenous people from the local area and their many visitors from remote communities across Central Australia. The council is Aboriginal owned and controlled and governed by an executive of elected town camp residents. Town Camp residents are some of the most disadvantaged people in Australia, living in the most challenging physical and social conditions.
As we are part of the Aboriginal owned and governed Tangentyere Councils’ Social Services division, for many of the Artists the Art Centre serves as respite and therapy from the daily grind, the alcohol, and the suicide epidemic of their young and other trouble in their lives. Tangentyere Artists are increasingly becoming known for the figurative paintings with textual references; reflections of everyday life in the Alice Springs Town Camps.
Through the creation of recycled metal jewellery and painted found objects, seed jewellery, painted wooden panels and acrylic on canvas, artists create classical as well as quirky and offbeat art objects.
Tangentyere Artists strives to develop community partnerships and new opportunities for artists, finding ways of communicating to broad audiences the experience and perspectives of the town camp artists. The art service empowers individual town camp residents beyond the everyday so they are able to achieve collectively what they could not do individually.
The art centre provides a platform from which artists can express themselves, their lives and cultural values, while enriching their community well being and family livelihoods.
We have a pretty busy exhibition and events schedule, but also run art therapy and well being projects, from suicide prevention work, introduction to yoga and meditation, and healthy eating.
If you are in Alice Springs, Australia, we invite you to drop in and see us, so we can show you in person what we do and aim to achieve.