Yam Dreaming (Red Dots) 1995

Emily Kame Kngwarreye's 'Yam Dreaming (Red Dots)' is a work in red, that might have been made with a brush or a sponge. I wonder about the artist making this, patiently applying each dot, thinking about yams – those starchy, tuberous root vegetables that feed and sustain. It's like Kngwarreye is painting the very essence of nourishment, of life springing forth from the earth. I bet she thought about the yam dreaming, its power, and how it connects to everything, and so put it all in this map of dots. The colour itself, a deep earthy red, feels so grounded. It speaks to the land, the ochre, the blood that runs through our veins. And those lines cutting through the dots, they remind me of fields, of cultivation, of the way we try to make sense of the world by organizing it. Kngwarreye's work has a raw energy, like the paintings of Hilma af Klint. Artists look to other artists to inspire their own creativity. It’s a conversation, a dialogue across time and space. There's no right or wrong way to interpret it, just an invitation to dream along with the artist.