Teresa Baker

Artist:  Teresa Baker

Born: 1977

Region: Kanpi APY Land

Language: Pitjantjatjara

  Teresa Baker was born in Alice Springs in 1977 and grew up in Kanpi, a small community in the APY Lands South Australia, where she lived with her grandparents, the celebrated artist Jimmy Baker and his wife. Teresa began painting in 2005 and has learnt from the renowned Baker family of Kanpi, including her grandfather, the late prominent law man and artist Jimmy Baker and her mother, Kay Baker, also a respected artist from the Tjungu Palya art centre. Teresa spent much of her childhood with her grandfather, Jimmy, learning about country and Tjukurpa. However, while her paintings have qualities reminiscent of her grandfather Jimmy Baker, she has developed her own distinctive  ancestral stories associated with her country. Teresa is continuing the tradition by teaching her daughters, Clarise and Sophia Tunkin,. Clarise is now a highly successful emerging artist. 

Teresa is a highly recognised and outstanding artist, Teresa has been a finalist in the AGNSW Wynne Prize and her work is exhibited Internationally and nationally. Teresa’s paintings have been collected by major public and private collectors, institutions and galleries.

Teresa’s style is rich in colour and story, defining aspects of her physical and spiritual country. Teresa paints the story of Minyma Malilu, a spiritual ancestor, who travelled from the west following her daughters who ran away with the "wrong" man. When she found them, she dug a cave nearby to live in, so she could keep watch over her daughter.

Teresa Baker first exhibited in 2007 and held her first solo exhibition at Vivien Anderson Gallery in 2015. She has been selected as a finalist for a number of important art awards including the Kate Challis RAKA Award at the University of Melbourne, and the Telstra National Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Art Award at the Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory in Darwin.

Her work was met with broad critical acclaim when she was featured in the 2017 exhibition Painting, More Painting at the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art (ACCA) in Melbourne, and her paintings are included in the collections of the University of Queensland Art Museum, Brisbane, Monash University, Museum of Art, Melbourne and ArtBank, Sydney, amongst others.