Harriette Bryant (b.1969) was born is Amata, Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY) Lands, and lives and works in Mimili Community. Throughout her childhood, Bryant journeyed across the country, from Cundalee Mission (Kalgoorlie), through Yalata, Pipalyatjara and Ooldea. Bryant’s travels through various communities and missions profoundly shaped her artistic vision and cultural understanding.
Working with transformed domestic objects—from silver serving trays to decorative coasters—Bryant subverts the familiar language of colonial domesticity. These found materials, once symbols of European settlement and propriety, become powerful vehicles for storytelling in her hands. Bryant’s practice weaves together family storylines and cultural memory, her alterations to these household items speaking simultaneously to displacement and reclamation. Bryant’s works offer new ways of understanding the Indigenous experience of Australian history through each of her transformed objects which carries layers of personal and collective meaning.
Bryant is a senior arts worker at Mimili Maku Arts. In 2024, Bryant was shortlisted in the National Works on Paper Prize at the Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery and selected to represent Mimili Maku Arts at the Desertmob Symposium in Mparntwe (Alice Springs). Bryant was a contributing artist as part of the collective for Mike William’s installation in the 22nd Biennale of Sydney: NIRIN at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney. Her work is held in collections both nationally and internationally, including Foundation Opale, Lens Switzerland.