Kitty Kantilla

Kitty Kantilla was a pioneering Tiwi artist whose sophisticated jilamara paintings established her as one of Australia's most significant Indigenous contemporary artists. Born at Piripumawu around 1928, Kitty grew up at Yimpinari on the eastern side of Melville Island. In 1970, she and several countrywomen created a small outstation at Paru in her mother's country, where she first began working as an artist through carving. Transitioning to painting on canvas and paper in 1992 through Jilamara Arts and Crafts Association, Kantilla developed a distinctive style deeply informed by the ornate body painting of Pukumani (mourning) ceremony. Using ochre-colored dots and lines, she created infinite compositional variations of rhythm, balance, and beauty, with her powerful inwardness hinging on deep resonance with customary ritual. Though highly charged with ceremony, her sophisticated and seemingly abstract iconography eludes legible symbolism—the different combinations of dots, lines, and blocks of color called jilamara, when combined, evoke elements of ritual and reveal the essence of her cultural identity. Her work is held in major collections including the National Gallery of Victoria, which presented a major retrospective exhibition in 2007-2008. Kantilla's innovative printmaking work with the Australian Print Workshop further extended her artistic legacy. She passed away in 2003, leaving an indelible mark on Australian contemporary art through her masterful translation of Tiwi ceremonial traditions into striking visual compositions.

Need to define the interactive map functionality, we can add lat/long values as custom fields TBD.

Subscribe to stay up to date on our exhibitions, artists, insights and more.

© All Rights Reserved 2026