Woven Into the Land – Country Road Homewares and Kieren Karritpul’s New Collection

In a new co-design partnership, award-winning Ngen’giwumirri painter Kieren Karritpul and Country Road have interpreted leitmotifs from the artist’s work into a limited-edition eight-piece range of homewares. The collection marks an artist-led approach to engaging First Nations talent for the iconic Australian lifestyle brand.

Living and working in the small community of Nauiyu (Daly River) south west of Darwin, Kieren hails from a family of distinguished artists and weavers and grew up watching his mother, Patricia McTaggart Marrfurra OAM, grandmother and great-grandmother all create highly detailed woven art pieces. Precluded from engaging in his own weaving practice as a male, Kieren instead uses the women’s intricately hand woven fishing nets, dilly bags and other textiles as inspiration for his richly layered paintings. “As a male, in my culture I am not permitted to weave so instead I paint weaving as a metaphor for land, landscape and the idea that indigenous Australians are born woven into the land,” Kieren explains. “I use my work to both educate people about our strong culture and traditions and also as a way to talk to people about our culture and history.”

“I use my work to both educate people about our strong culture and traditions and also as a way to talk to people about our culture and history.”

Working alongside Kieren on the collection was Country Road’s Head of Design for Home, Ty Symonds. “When Kieren was sharing his stories of home with us, the importance of the billabongs, mermaids and turtles of the Naiyu community became really clear. That’s when we decided on a dining range because it was about life giving, sharing with family and community,” Ty says.

The result is an eight-piece collection that also engages the talents of two artisanal studios in Victoria – Bendigo Pottery, which created the ceramic pieces and Printink Studio, who provided hand-screen-printing for the linen table runner and tea towels. “It has been amazing meeting all the team and other artisans,” says Kieren of the collaboration process. “I feel connected to them and am looking forward to the launch.”

A 2021 Ramsay Art Prize finalist, Kieren’s work can be found in major collections including National Gallery of Australia, Canberra; Museum of Applied Arts and Social Sciences, Sydney and Artbank.

Kieren first met with Country Road Homewares in 2020, as a result of his being awarded the prestigious National Indigenous Fashion Award for Textile Design. Since then, both brand and artist have worked together through a considered process of co-design, with Kieren’s art deeply woven into the material, shape and function of every piece. “We began slowly talking regularly on Zoom and developing ideas, it has taken three years,” Kieren recalls. “I went to Bendigo and Melbourne and Ty Symonds and the Country Road team have visited Nauiyu.”

A 2021 Ramsay Art Prize finalist, Kieren’s work can be found in major collections including National Gallery of Australia, Canberra; Museum of Applied Arts and Social Sciences, Sydney and Artbank. His works typically stretch across formidably sized canvases, line and colour reverberating with the light and landscape. The process of shrinking his usual scale to one suitable for adorning a ceramic bowl or table runner was akin to a paring back, Kieren says. “I have taken and refined some of the essential elements in my large-scale works like the small turtles and the mermaids’ face.”