LT3

Elizabeth Yanyi Close, Thomas Readett, Shane Mankitya Kooka

Tarnanthi 2021

October 9 - November 28, 2021

For Cook, Close and Readett the act of making art is compulsory for themselves but also their culture. The art they create is an extension of a 60,000 year old painting practice that has been constantly evolving and reshaping over time.

In this project the artists will transform the interior of the Hahndorf Academy, cladding the walls in a dynamic spread of large scale collaborative murals blending Shanes illustrative and fluid street art styled mark making with Elizabeth’s bold and graphic designs linking with and throughout Thomas’ abstracted realism. Cook, Close and Readett will use this opportunity to extend the paintings ‘outside of the frame’ by painting directly onto the walls to challenge and create curiosity within their audiences.

Thomas Readett (Ngarrindjeri/Arrernte), Elizabeth Yanyi Close (Pitjantjara/Yankunytjatjara ) and Shane Mankitya Kooka (Wulli Wulli/Koa)

Artist Bios

Shane Mankitya Kooka is a Guwa and Wulli Wulli man with family connections to Cherbourg, Queensland. Born on Kaurna Country, he is recognised nationally and internationally as an aerosol artist, combining graffiti-like styles with traditional mark making, and a tattoo artist. He found his connection to his Aboriginality by drawing with his Mother as he recovered from third degree burns. Shane went on to establish himself as a graffiti artist. He was given the name 3rd because of his burns, and gifted the name “Mankitya” by the local Kaurna community which translates to “the scarred one’’.

Elizabeth Yanyi Close is an Anangu woman from the Pitjantjatjara and Yankunytjatjara language groups in Central Australia, and an established Contemporary Aboriginal Visual Artist based in Adelaide. She has spent the past 14 years crafting a dynamic multi-disciplinary visual arts practice that speaks to both her own, personal Connection to Country, and the concept of connection to place and space more broadly. She works in the mediums of 2D visual arts, large scale muralist installations and digital media.

Thomas Readett is a Ngarrindjeri man and established artist born and raised on Kaurna Country. Thomas’ graphic aesthetic of realism painting is powerfully rendered in black and white, with careful attention to detail. He melds street art style with classical training (BVA) to produce work that is both technical and conceptual. Recently Readett has pushed his practice into 3D sculptural space, playing with the pictorial plane and interrupting our usual modes of artistic interpretation. Thomas graduated his Associates Degree and Bachelor of Visual Arts in 2015 from Adelaide Central School of Art mastering in Oil painting.