Barbara Weir painted this artwork titled Grass Seed Dreaming in 2008 with acrylic paint on linen, size 160 x 200 cm.

Story

Traditionally, food gathering dominated the lives of indigenous women. Barbara experienced this as a child and again as an adult. For her, the grass seed, which was crushed into flour after collection and then used to make bread, was to become a dominant image. The grass, called Lyaw, Munyeroo or Pigs-weed, and its seed had provided sustenance to her people for thousands of generations. Accordingly, she had an affection and understanding for it. Her paintings of this subject show it in various ways ... sometimes on fire, sometimes after fire, and sometimes in periods of lush growth. The swaying rhythms of the grass provide the foundations for original and seductive paintings. These, however, take on a great depth and appeal when the underlying story is revealed.