Ancestral Integrity. by Kane Brunjes

Kane Brunjes is a Kabi Kabi Gunggari man and artist with Birrunga Gallery. His self-portrait Ancestral Integrity responds to a simple but profound question: what cannot be replicated or replaced? At its centre stands Brunjes himself, his physical presence anchored in the now. Behind and beside him, three figures hover – his Old People, his ancestors, travelling with him as energy and influence.

The work evolved as it was being made, its colour palette shifting when Brunjes moved house mid-painting. What emerged was intentional, deep reds to depict Country, electric blues and whites that capture the feeling just before a storm breaks, a heightened, euphoric charge in the air. “The energy in the work comes from painting with the thought of my Old People beside me.”