Vanessa Inkamala

Vanessa Inkamala was born in 1968 and comes from Hermannsburg Community approximately 1 hour from Alice Springs in Central Australia. Vanessa is the great uncle is Albert Namatjira and the niece of award winning artist Ivy Pareroultja.

Vanessa now lives in Alice Springs but continues to paint in the water colour tradition found throughout her family and Hermannsburg Community. She paints the landscapes of her ancestors which is also the country she belongs to. Though Vanessa was already a skilled artist, she learnt and adopted a new artistic style specific to Santa Teresa, in which she paints spiritual women. The spiritual women who are the subjects of Vanessa’s work are guardians of the land and remain invisible most of the time. Often, they look after a network of waterholes alongside the riverbed. If intruders come stealing some of the country resources such as bush tucker or water, the spiritual women will come out and the offenders will disappear forever.

Itjara Ntjarra - Many Hands Art Centre.