Ada Bird Petyarre was born c. 1935 on Utopia Station at Atnangkere, approximately 270 km’s north of Alice Springs in the Northern Territory of Australia. She died in 2009.

Ada was one of the seven well known Petyarre sisters and shared with them the Dreaming of the Mountain Devil Lizard (Arnkerrthe).

Along with her sisters, Ada was one of the original artists who participated in the successful 1977 Utopia Women’s Batik program. She was introduced to painting with acrylic on canvas in 1988 when she took part in CAAMA’s “A Summer Project”, which launched the women artists of Utopia on to the world stage. She had her first solo exhibition in 1990.

Ada is internationally acclaimed for her bold, colourful and linear designs associated with Awelye for Arnkerrthe – women’s ceremonial body paint designs for the Mountain Devil Lizard.

Whilst incorporating traditional designs and patterns, Ada’s paintings are an abstract and contemporary representation of her country and Dreaming.

There are only very few paintings of Ada available for sale and they are becoming increasingly difficult to source and for this reason will most likely experience a dramatic increase in price since she was one of the founders of the Utopia art movement

Collections

Robert Holmes a Court Collection
National Gallery of Australia
Art Gallery of New South Wales
Richard Kelton Foundation, Santa Monica, USA
University of Queensland Collection

^© Boomerang Art 2010