Barbara Weir 1940-2023
20 1/8 x 57 1/2 inches
Barbara Weir was a prominent Aboriginal artist who had significant
influence on the contemporary Indigenous art industry. Her
mother was the renowned Utopia artist, the late, great Minnie Pwerle. Barbara, as a mixed-race child, was abducted by "welfare" officers around the age of 10, and was taken from her home and family. It was decades and fortuitous circumstance that brought Barbara back to Utopia, giving her the chance to reconnect to her forgotten language, culture and extended family.
involved with the batiks, and like many of her family members, transitioned to
painting on canvas from the 1980s onwards. She inherited several Dreaming stories - all
associated with Awelye, women’s ceremony and women’s business – including
Bush Berry, Grass Seed, Wild Flower, and My Mother’s Country. Grass
Seeds, as depicted in this painting, uses a linear convention, layering
filaments of colour that lend an undulating or “weaving” effect to her
canvases.