A Call for Change from Iluwanti Ken
Award-winning artist and Pitjantjatjara Elder and ngangkari (traditional healer) Iluwanti Ken has raised concerns about the treatment of the APY Art Centre Collective following allegations of “white hands on black art”. These claims have led to a series of investigations, the postponement of a major exhibition, and the collective’s expulsion from the Indigenous Art Code.
Ken, a co-founder of the collective, recently became a finalist in the Wynne Prize and was the subject of the portrait that won the Archibald Prize. The APY Art Centre Collective (APYACC) is made up of artists and arts centres from the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY) Lands in the far north-west of South Australia.
The “white hands on black art” scandal alleged the interference of non-Indigenous assistants in works made by Indigenous artists in the APY Lands. This led to a series of investigations, the postponement of a major exhibition, and the collective’s expulsion from the Indigenous Art Code, which governs the relationship between Indigenous artists and art dealers.
Despite these allegations, several investigations into the collective found no adverse findings. Ken expressed her frustration in a letter to government and arts industry leaders, dated Friday, May 22.
“How can I be celebrated as one of Australia’s most important artists, while also being treated as though I do not belong in my own industry?” she wrote. “The APY Art Centre Collective has faced allegations publicly and painfully. We lived through it. Our names, our art centres, and our communities were damaged.”
She emphasized that the APY Art Centre Collective is an extraordinary Aboriginal-led organisation built by Anangu people for Anangu people. It is one of the best and most important things she has helped create in her life. It is a gift to her grandkids, in her community, Amata, and across the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Lands. It is theirs, for their future.
Ken added that the Indigenous Art Code had not reinstated the collective despite it being cleared of wrongdoing. She detailed how the collective lost funding and has been excluded from the wider sector.
“At the very moment APYACC artists and projects are being celebrated through the Archibald and Wynne Prizes, the National Gallery of Australia, the Biennale of Sydney, and the Adelaide Biennial, the organisation those artists built is being excluded from industry funding and opportunities,” Ken wrote.
She ended the letter by requesting a meeting of visual art leaders from across the country, including federal Arts Minister Tony Burke and Art Gallery of New South Wales (AGNSW) director Maud Page, to “address these important issues collectively”.
Earlier this month, the APY Art Centre Collective also called for a federal inquiry into the Indigenous arts sector to examine the conduct of art dealers and the Indigenous Art Code.
The Consequences of the ‘White Hands on Black Art’ Scandal
In 2023, a video published by The Australian appeared to show a non-Indigenous assistant directing the painting of a work about sacred beliefs and laws by Yartiji Young, who denied the assistant had interfered with her work. The story triggered investigations by the South Australian government, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), and the Office of the Registrar of Indigenous Corporations (ORIC).
The South Australian government review, helmed by a senior lawyer and two First Nations executives, made no findings in December 2023, and referred the allegations to the ACCC and ORIC. In July 2024, the ACCC discontinued its investigation, saying it found nothing to suggest consumer law had been breached. Six months later, in January 2025, ORIC “decided to take no further action”, adding “no adverse inference” should be drawn from the end of its investigation.
The “white hands on black art” story also led to the postponement of the exhibition Ngura Puḻka — Epic Country at the National Gallery of Australia (NGA), intended for 2023, which was to feature APY Art Centre Collective Artists. An independent review by the gallery into the “provenance and creation” of 28 paintings concluded there had been no improper interference. The exhibition opened in April 2026 and features artwork by Ken and 48 other artists.
Tina Baum, head of First Nations art at NGA, told the ABC in April: “Since the investigation, of course, those claims against ‘the white hands on black art’ were disputed. There’s no warrant in them at all. The artists have 100 per cent authorship of their artworks in this exhibition.”
According to Ken’s letter, the collective no longer receives Indigenous Visual Arts Industry Support funding from the federal government or from Creative Australia. Ken said the collective had also been excluded from the Darwin Aboriginal Art Fair, where it once exhibited, and is “now required to undertake a separate process to submit” to the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Arts Awards (NATSIAAs).
Last year, Ken won the General Painting Award at the NATSIAAs and is a finalist this year. “These additional barriers feel like ongoing punishment and make me feel ultimately unwelcome at an event that I have invested so much of my professional life supporting,” Ken said. “These decisions affect remote Aboriginal communities, artists’ incomes, jobs, opportunities for young people, and the future of Aboriginal-owned art centres.”
The Museum and Art Gallery of Northern Territory (MAGNT), which runs the NATSIAAs, said in a statement that according to the awards’ guidelines, entries must be submitted by either an artist or their agent — but an agent must be a member of the Indigenous Art Code. “Individual ‘Artist’ entries do not require the artist to be a member of the Indigenous Art Code and therefore do not exclude any eligible artist from entering Telstra NATSIAA,” the statement read.
ABC Arts has also contacted the Darwin Aboriginal Art Fair and the Indigenous Art Code for comment. Ken added that the arts centres that make up the collective had written to the code and government asking for the collective to be reinstated to the Indigenous Art Code.
“But this is not simply about our organisation,” she wrote. “This is about whether Aboriginal artists and Aboriginal-led organisations are allowed to succeed on their own terms.” “This is about whether systems created to protect Indigenous artists are truly doing that job. I cannot be both the face of celebrated Australian art and the head of an organisation that does not belong in our industry. I am an old lady now. I do not want a false story to become part of my legacy.”
