D’Lan Contemporary returned to Frieze Masters, London for its third consecutive year this year, with a presentation that celebrated the work of two pioneering artists from the Western Desert, Makinti Napanangka (c. 1920 – 2011) and Naata Nungurrayi (c. 1932 – 2021).

The response to their work at the Fair was overwhelming. Eight of eleven works in the exhibition sold for a total of AUD$1,200,000 (USD$780,000), and a new record was set for each of these important artists with the two leading works, Untitled – Lupulnga 2008 by Makinti Napanangka and Untitled – Marrapinti 2006 by Naata Nungurrayi, each selling for AUD$280,000 (USD$182,000). 

Both artists began ​p​ainting in 1996, the same year that Emily Kam Kngwarray—whose success inspired many Aboriginal women in remote desert communities to spearhead a new wave in Australian Indigenous art—passed away. These two innovative artists, with their distinct perspectives, ​continued to expand the field of women’s desert art and ​together, transformed the visual language of the Australian desert landscape.

Makinti Napanangka (c. 1920 – 2011) was a pivotal figure in the evolution of contemporary Indigenous Australian art. A Pintupi woman from the Western Desert region of the Northern Territory, Napanangka’s painting practice weaves complex Indigenous ontology with themes of memory, nostalgia, and diaspora. Up until young adulthood, Napanangka lived a nomadic lifestyle with her small family group, travelling vast distances on foot and fulfilling the cultural and ceremonial obligations of her traditional country. The ancestral narratives embedded in this landscape have been the primary subject of her paintings since the mid-1990s, which are characterised by a gestural approach with freedom and sensitivity. The alternation and harmony of desert-hued blues, purples, yellows, oranges, and whites represent the swaying movement of the hair-spun skirts ancestral women wore while engaged in ceremonial dance.

Naata Nungurrayi (c.1932 – 2021) remains one of the most original and significant figures in contemporary Indigenous Australian art. Celebrated as an instinctive painter, she depicted spiritual sites of her desert homeland with a blend of cultural authority, artistic spontaneity, conviction, and eccentricity. Nungurrayi played a role in transforming gender representation within the Western Desert art movement in Australia and led other Pintupi women in helping to elevate contemporary Indigenous Australian art. By expressing the feminine aspect of Indigenous cultural life, she created a distinctive iconography of armlets, grids, and mollusc-like forms submerged in striking layers of mottled colour, illustrating the topographies shaped by ancestral travels and events across her Country.

‘The energy in London, and the awareness and appreciation for First Nations art at the Fair – no doubt buoyed by the major retrospective of Emily Kam Kngwarray’s work currently on view at Tate Modern – was uplifting and indicative of a shift in mood the international marketplace. We look forward to returning to Frieze Masters in 2026, and to further expanding awareness of and appreciation for Australian First Nations art and artists on the global stage that this Fair provides.’ – Luke Scholes, Director and Vanessa Merlino, Head of Research, D’Lan Contemporary.

Read more about Frieze Masters 2025 at frieze.com and in this article by Artnet and Artlyst.