Kaylene Whiskey
Kaylene TV
The work is a short animation of minimal movements and transitions introducing the usual characters that appear in the artist’s canvases. Experienced as a music video clip, the work commences with an image of a vintage TV set covered with dots, referencing art of the Anangu Indigenous culture. Through the beat of a funky rhythm and blues, Kaylen’s voice announces her appearance on ABC (Australia Broadcasting Corporation) the national TV network. Suddenly, the first woman/superhero appears wearing the Aboriginal flag, symbol of self-determination and land rights struggles since the 1970s. The screen of Kaylene’s TV continues to be populated with symbolism, including honey ants, which hold dietary and spiritual importance – Indigenous women of different Nations in the Northern Territory search for the nests of these ants found in Mulga trees. Kaylene’s moving image work was a transformative moment in her practice as she experiments with a new media and amplifies connectivity with spectators.
Kaylene Whiskey’s appropriation of Western pop culture, American mainstream television, manifests itself in a unique empowering visual language; a fantasy world where a black wonder woman befriends Dolly Parton. Her iconography merges comic style figuration alongside the ‘dot’ iconography of Australia’s Central Desert, stemming from her Anangu culture. Her paintings celebrate happiness and joy as forms of resilience, and indirectly challenge the cultural essentialisms projected upon Aboriginal art. Her unapologetic liberty and life philosophy debunks the paternalistic establishment of ‘White Australia’ institutionality, as it devours its culture. The scripts of Whiskey’s videos are produced closely through her vision and direction, and they almost always include her own voice and narrative as voice over or singing. Her position in contemporary First Nations art has radically transgressed the art field, turning her art and story part of the public sphere’s conscience on Aboriginal representation, becoming perhaps the most iconic living female artist in Australia today, having national and international exhibitions.