ACMI in partnership with Artbank proudly announces Mparntwe (Alice Springs) Arrernte and Southern Luritja artist Sally M Nangala Mulda and Arrernte and Western Arrarnta artist Marlene Rubuntja as joint recipients of the third and final $70,000 Artbank + ACMI Commission for their proposed new animation Two Girls.
Two Girls will tell the intertwining stories of Sally and Marlene, both renowned Town Camp artists, who shared their childhood at the Amoonguna Settlement in the Northern Territory and remained in contact to the present day. Their work will chronicle the artists’ successes and struggles, showcasing the reality of life for Indigenous Australians in Central Australia, ultimately celebrating their enduring friendship.
Artist Marlene Rubuntja said: “I feel really proud of Sally and her paintings. She tells really good stories when she does her paintings. I love my sewing with all my heart and always think about lots of memories too. Now we can make this film together about when we were two little girls in Amoonguna. She can do painting and I can do sewing, and we can feel really proud telling this story together.”
Figures from Marlene’s soft sculptures and Sally’s acrylic on linen paintings will star in the animation, embedded on top of Marlene’s ink on paper works of the Central Australian landscape. The work will be produced by Ludo Studio (Bluey).
Sally and Marlene have extensive experience creating films with their respective art centers Tangentyere and Yarrenyty Arltere, and their works have been acquired and exhibited by major institutions including the Art Gallery of New South Wales and Araluen Art Centre.
ACMI Director & CEO Seb Chan said: “We’re delighted to award Marlene Rubuntja and Sally M Nangala Mulda the third and final Artbank + ACMI Commission. Honouring First Peoples’ storytelling, Two Girls sits at the convergence of contemporary art and moving image practice to share important stories from the artists’ lives and communities in Central Australia. These are stories that all Australians need to see and hear - and ACMI is proud to be a part of bringing them to a wider audience.”
Artbank CEO Zoë Rodriguez said: “Marlene Rubuntja and Sally M Nangala Mulda are fabulous artists individually, and we are thrilled to support this collaboration for the 2022 Artbank + ACMI Commission - we can’t wait to see what their creative visions and expertise combined will bring. Two Girls empowers the stories of First Nations women and shows innovation from the community to bring their soft sculpture and painting practices to life. We feel this exciting fusion of the old and new will enable their story to be seen and heard broadly. After the exhibition at ACMI, this work will be available for loan through the Artbank leasing program.
Artbank is proud of its long-standing commitment to video art, and especially pleased to be partnering with ACMI for a third time to provide artists with the all-important creative time to produce a new work of excellence.”
Established in partnership with Artbank, the federal government’s flagship support program for Australian contemporary artists, the Artbank + ACMI Commission is a three-year commissioning program that enables Australian artists and filmmakers to create new works that are conceived at the intersection of art and cinema. This is the third and final commission in the series.
This series has expanded ACMI’s vibrant commissioning program, which through a series of collaborations – with Artbank, Ian Potter Foundation, City of Melbourne and the Mordant Family – will directly fund Australian artists to create new work and then exhibit it to thousands of people at ACMI and beyond.
Two Girls: Sally M Nangala and Marlene Rubuntja will be exhibited at ACMI in 2023-2024.
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ABOUT ACMI:
ACMI is Australia’s national museum of screen culture. The museum reopened in February 2021 after a two-year, $40 million redevelopment – an architectural, programmatic and technological transformation. Navigate the universe of film, TV, videogames and art with ACMI. The museum celebrates the wonder and power of the world’s most democratic artform – fostering the next generation of makers, players and watchers. ACMI’s vibrant calendar of exhibitions, screenings, commissions, festivals, and industry and education programs explore the stories, technologies and artists that create our shared screen culture. More at acmi.net.au
ABOUT ARTBANK:
Artbank is a unique government artist support and access initiative. Since 1980 we have supported thousands of Australian artists, through the acquisition of their work, building an impressive collection of over 10,000 artworks.
Artbank is one of the most accessible and significant collections of Australian art anywhere in the world promoting the value of Australian contemporary art to the broader public via a unique art leasing program.
Artbank has been collecting, curating and promoting the value of Australian art for over 40 years and with the generous support of our clients we will continue to invest in the future of Australian art. More at artbank.gov.au
For further information, interviews and images, please contact
Stephanie Payne
Senior Publicist, ACMI
E: stephanie.payne@acmi.net.au
T:+61 476 665 278