Home Topics History & Culture VIDEO: Aboriginal artists of Coober Pedy

VIDEO: Aboriginal artists of Coober Pedy

Image credit: Vincent Long

THE STRENGTH OF diversity of Coober Pedy is reflected within many Aboriginal families. Local artist Katrina Williams is one of five sisters, all of whom live in Coober Pedy and carry on a family tradition.

“My grandmother was from here but grandfather’s people came from Utopia in the Territory. All his family paint and so do we,” says Katrina, as she gazes across a bright bushtucker painting that’s big enough to cover her dining table. “It’s what we do when we get together. I was crap at first but it didn’t take long. It was like I had it in me.”

The art success of the Williams sisters is another marker of the opportunities this far-flung town continues to offer.

• Gallery: Coober Pedy
• Coober Pedy, outpost in the outback

Read Next

Indigenous rock art sites ‘chosen’ for vantage

Researchers have discovered internationally significant rock art sites in Arnhem Land were far from random and instead “chosen” for the critical vantage points they provided.

Defining Moments in Australian History: Australia’s first Olympian

1896: Edwin Flack races into history.

The whaling captain, a secret plan and one of Australia’s boldest prison escapes

On 19 April 1876, a group of Irish Fenian prisoners who became known as the 'Fremantle Six' escaped from Australian authorities. However, the plan to secure their freedom began more than a year earlier and thousands of kilometres away.