Yuungla Bangay

yuungla bangay (long ago today) is a survey of an art making practice spanning fifteen years. Nicole Chaffey, a Newcastle-based artist, began her formal education at Newcastle Art School (TAFE) in 2006, continued at the School of Creative Arts at Newcastle University, and completed her postgraduate studies at Wollotuka in 2015.

As a Biripi woman, much of Chaffey’s practice is intrinsically linked with identity, Country, and cultural practice. Her postgraduate research (2012 – 2015) reflected on inheritance and relationship; ties between her ancestral Biripi Country and her grandfather, while her most recent work revisits familial narratives, diving into the dark distant pasts of ancestors’ misdeeds and resilience.

Collectively, yuungla bangay charts the course through which Chaffey has cultivated a unique visual language and a distinctive approach to colour and form revealing the essence of lived experience and a love for landscape.