Sarrita King | Ancestors
| Medium | Acrylic on Linen |
| Year | 2013 |
| Size | 100 x 160 cm |
Sarrita’s “Ancestors” paintings, are layered with dots. Markings made on the land over thousands of years can be seen entangled with patterns covering the land today, such as sand hills, flora and paths made by humans and animals.
Beneath the land are the waterways which have been virtually constant over time feeding the land, the flora, fauna and humans. These are the same waterways that supplied our ancestors which are now one with the land.
Sarrita King’s biography
Sarrita King was born in Adelaide, South Australia on the 5th March, 1988. She is the younger sister to fellow artist, Tarisse King and daughter to the late highly regarded artist, William King Jungala (1966 – 2007).
Sarrita inherits her Australian Aboriginality from her father who was part of the Gurindji clan from the Northern Territory. The Gurindji clan came to public attention during the 1960s and 1970s when members employed by the Wave Hill cattle station led a landmark case which became the first successful land rights claim in Australia. It is this same strong sense of self and pride that Sarrita embodies and it fuels her drive to paint her totemic landscape.
Sarrita spent most of her youth growing up in Darwin in the Northern Territory. Not far from where her ancestors inhabited, it is here that her connection to her Aboriginality and subsequently the land was able to grow. Her exposure to the imperious weather and extreme landscape has provided the thematic for her works of art since she began painting at age 16. Rolling sand hills, cracking lightning and thunderstorms, torrential rain, fire, desert and tangled bush are all scathing environmental factors that shaped her fore father’s lives and also her own. Depicting these elements in her paintings, Sarrita provides a visual articulation of the earth’s language.
Stylistically, Sarrita utilises traditional Aboriginal techniques such as ‘dotting’ but also incorporates unorthodox techniques taught to her by her father as well as self developed techniques. Her art is a fusion of past, present and future and represents the next generation of artists who have been influenced by both their indigenous past and current Western upbringing. Sarrita creates frenetic energy on the canvas with her Lightning series and searing heat with her Fire series. Her aesthetic has a universal appeal and provides an entry point for people to experience the power and uniqueness of the Australian landscape and its harsh climate. On a world scale, her depictions couldn’t be timelier.
Sarrita now paints in Adelaide in a shared studio with her sister. She has been included in over 20 exhibitions, is represented in galleries in every Australian state, included in many high profile Australian and international art collections, been auctioned successfully through Paris’ Art Curial and is about to embark on a European exhibition tour in 2010.
Sarrita continues to be involved with netball at a state level in South Australian. She is currently taking a break from her Bachelor of Journalism at the University of South Australia to persue her interest in digital media, specifically documentary making. At the age of 22, Sarrita King has many personal achievements but it is her desire to visually communicate her inspiration, the land, which keeps her ancestral narrative alive and provides a new way of looking back while looking forward.
