Yvonne Koolmatrie


Yvonne Koolmatrie is an Australian artist and weaver of the Ngarrindjeri people, working in South Australia.

Early life

Koolmatrie was born in Wudinna, Eyre Peninsula, South Australia. Her father was a Kokatha man, Joseph Roberts, and her mother Margaret was a Ngarrindjeri / Ramindjeri woman from the Coorong. Koolmatrie grew up in Meningie and the Coorong region, later moving to the Riverland town, Berri.

Career

Koolmatrie learned her craft in the early 1980s from elder and weaver, Dorothy Kartinyeri. Their coiled bundle technique uses local spiny-headed sedge, known to the artist as bilbili and river rushes, and Koolmatrie is credited with saving the traditional Ngarrindjeri craft. Her weavings include eel traps, turtles, mats, bowls and models of biplanes.She was excited by the potential offered by woven sedge grass and this was seen, by Stephen Gilchrist as having “freed her imagination to breathe life into the fantastic woven articulations that are now her trademark.”
Her works are included in many major galleries including the National Museum of Ethnology in Osaka, Japan; South Australian Museum; National Museum of Australia; Art Gallery of Western Australia; National Gallery of Victoria; and National Gallery of Australia.
In 1997, she was selected to represent Australia at the 47th Venice Biennale with Judy Watson and Emily Kame Kngwarreye. In 2016 she was awarded the Red Ochre Award, peer-assessed recognition.

Honours and recognition