Dianne Ungukalpi Golding

Dianne Ungukalpi Golding is an artist belonging to the Ngaanyatjarra language and cultural group in Western Australia, and lives with her family in Warakurna.

Dianne has made baskets for a number of years and first learnt from relatives in Warakurna. She enjoys experimenting with different shapes and says: “Some long like piti (traditional wood dish), some round like the sun.” She has since made a number of sculptural pieces drawing inspiration from the animals prevalent on the Ngaanyatjarra Lands, whether they be the camp dogs in the community or the goannas, porcupines, or rabbits hunted out bush.

Dianne exhibited her first sculptural piece, a large camel, at Desert Mob 2006 in Alice Springs. She has then exhibited her fibre artwork with Tjanpi Desert Weavers every year since 2012. Notable amongst these exhibitions is String Theory at the Museum of Contemporary Art Sydney NSW in 2013, Desert Mob 2015 and 2016 in Alice Springs NT, and Flight at FORM Gallery in Perth WA 2017. Dianne’s Helicopter and Camels sculptures exhibited at Flight were later acquired by the state collection held by the Western Australian Museum. This delightful and humorous piece depicts the story of Ngaanyatjarra Senior Man and Ranger, Mr Bennett, mustering camels out of Warakurna community.

Dianne was one of the artists involved in the  collaborative, a commission from the National Gallery of Australia for the Know My Name : Australian Women Artists : 1900 to Now exhibition. She also worked on a family collaborative with her sister, daughter-in-law and grand-daughter on Pitja Nyawa Kulila Pampula (Come, Look, Listen, Touch), an immersive work created for the three-year national travelling exhibition Tension(s) : Tamworth Textile Triennial.

Dianne is a kind, feisty and intensely funny woman who has overcome extreme odds to become a highly successful artist and an inspiration to her family and community.