Fay Farmer b. 1953 Narrogin, WA

Also known as Faye Farmer
  • Artist (Painter), (Textile Artist / Fashion Designer), (Ceramist)
Noongar painter based in Perth who also created batik and ceramic work at the Marribank Artists Cooperative in the 1980s.
Talk | Version history | Updated Oct. 19, 2011 | Created Jan. 1, 2009
Name
Fay Farmer
Also known as Faye Farmer
Birth date
1953
Birth place
Narrogin, WA
Gender
Female
Roles
  • Artist (Painter)
  • Artist (Textile Artist / Fashion Designer)
  • Artist (Ceramist)
Residence
  • Bunbury, WA
  • 1969- 1973 Gnowangerup, WA
  • 1973- 1978 Narrogin, WA
  • 1953- 1969 Narrogin, WA
  • Perth, WA
  • 1978- 1985 Marribank, Katanning, WA
Languages
  • English
Training
Is Indigenous
Yes
Heritage Country
  • Kojonup, WA
  • Narrogin, WA
Initial Record Data Source
  • Storylines Project, COFA, UNSW

Fay Farmer, Noongar artist and member of the Goreng people, was born in 1953 in Narrogin, Western Australia, and raised by her grandmother. She moved to Gnowangerup in 1969, the year she met her husband, and returned to Narrogin in 1973. Between 1978 and 1985 she and her family lived at Marribank, near Katanning, which was previously the Carrolup Native Settlement. While there she was a member of the Marribank Artists Cooperative, which established a thriving business selling a range of textile and ceramic work in the 1980s. This was a particularly exciting period in Farmer’s artistic career. Farmer is also a painter who draws her inspiration from the landscapes and colours of the south-west region of Western Australia, and creates works which depict native animals and food sources such as bobtail fish, goanna and emu. She is also a singer, and has undertaken studies at Abmusic in Waterford, Western Australia.

Farmer has five children, one of whom, Peter Farmer, is a successful Noongar artist who has exhibited widely in Western Australia. Her works have been acquired by the Art Gallery of Western Australia and the Berndt Museum of Anthropology, and one of Farmer’s vases, created while she was at Marribank, was included in the 'South West Central’ exhibition at the The Art Gallery of Western Australia in 2003. In 2009 she was living in Perth and had enrolled in a Certificate III course in Visual Arts and Contemporary Craft – a course coordinated by Joanna Robertson at the Kidogo Institute in Fremantle, Western Australia.

This entry is a stub. You can help the DAAO by submitting a biography.

Writers:
Fisher, Laura
Date written:
2009
Last updated:
2011
parent of
Peter Farmer
1971
Artist (Painter)
artist
spouse of
Peter Farmer
1971
Artist (Painter)
Noongar elder, community leader and language specialist
associate of
Marjorie Hansen
1922
Artist (Painter)
Hansen, Marjorie: Close friend, now deceased, who was at Marribank at the same time as Farmer. / Farmer, Fay: Friends linked by family - both were at Marribank at the same time, two of Fay's brothers married two of Hansen's daughters.
associate of
Joanna Robertson
Non-Artist/Designer/Curator
parent of
Peter Farmer
1971
Artist (Painter)
Noongar artist
relative of
Athol Farmer
1960
Artist (Painter)
sister-in-law
associate of
Merribank Artists Cooperative
Non-Artist/Designer/Curator
associate of
Kidogo Arthouse, Fremantle, WA
Non-Artist/Designer/Curator
Pottery Vase
Date
1985
In the collection of the Berndt Museum of Anthropology, University of Western Australia.
Collections
South West Central: Indigenous art from south Western Australia 1833-2002
2003
Exhibition ()
Art Gallery of Western Australia, Perth, WA
http://www.artgallery.wa.gov.au/exhibitions/x_southwestcentral.asp
Citations:
  • Farmer, Fay, (2009), Artist information sheet, (Place: Kidogo Institute, Fremantle, WA)
  • Croft, B. & Watson, A (eds), (2003), South West Central: Indigenous Art from south Western Australia 1833-2002, (Reference to Marribank Artists Cooperative, pp. 29, 58-59. Place: Art Gallery of Western Australia, Perth, WA)