Sally Scales backs APYACC boss Skye O’Meara, defends white staff who painted on APY artist’s canvas

APY artist Sally Scales has attacked a government probe into white hands on Indigenous art and defended the white studio staff who painted on the canvas of another APY artist.

Arts administrator Skye O'Meara.

APY artist Sally Scales has launched an attack on the government probe into white hands on Indigenous art and defended the white studio staff who painted on the canvas of another APY artist Yaritji Young.

Ms Scales, a prominent Indigenous artist and executive board member of the APYACC, also said it was up to elders if controversial APY art chief Skye O’Meara should stay in her position.

Skye O'Meara, (C) with artist, Rhoda Tjitayi (L), and Sally Scales (R). Picture: Dean Martin

“We had a meeting yesterday with the board and my elders. I look at it in this way, the company has been successful because of my elders,” she told ABC RN Breakfast on Wednesday.

“Skye O’Meara has been part of our team since the start of it. Our elders actually resent these calls because it’s actually an attack on their leadership.

“From all those people telling us we couldn’t have this success that we do have, that we couldn’t be what we wanted to be, that we couldn’t be ambitious, and for them to turn around and say, well your manager has to step aside ... who’s this easier for. This is our company and the board is fully committed to our staff and we look at it and go, that’s not your call. That’s our call.”

Ms Scales said the APYACC has been unfairly targeted.

She defended the use of white staff in a video published by The Australian which showed an assistant painting on Yaritji Young’s canvas.

“That 60 second video of Yaritji doesn’t show her 15-year career, doesn’t show her integrity as a senior woman who’s in her power, doesn’t show the conversations that happen,” she said.

NGA Director Nick Mitzevich and Sally Scales. Picture: Instagram

“These allegations have been flying around like confetti around the APY and the collective where there isn’t much detail and rigour into it, and we’ve had a very robust sort of conversation.

“The artistic support ... and the nature of having studio assistants is an entitlement that every artist and every contemporary professional artist has.”

Ms Scales said she didn’t necessarily have faith in the government reviews. “I have faith in my elders. I have always had faith in my elders.

“I wouldn’t say I necessarily have faith in the reviews in that way because (South Australian Premier) Andrea Michaels is doing what she wants to do in that space and we will partake and we will be open and transparent,” she said.

No white flag from besieged APY Aboriginal art boss Skye O’Meara

O’Meara is fast running out of friends, with federal Arts Minister Tony Burke saying he had “no reason to question the judgment” of his South Australian and Northern Territory counterparts who have called on the arts administrator to step down.

SA Arts Minister Andrea Michaels and Chansey Paech, her NT colleague, have both called on Ms O’Meara to step down while the tri-government investigation they oversee delves into alle­gations of unethical practices within her organisation, the APY Art Centre Collective.

Mr Burke told The Australian he was “fully supportive of the actions the SA government has taken in establishing this review … if the SA government is of the view (that) the review would be best served by having the CEO stand aside, I have no reason to question that judgment.”

Ms O’Meara, the driving force behind establishment of the ­APYACC in 2016 and the woman behind its phenomenal success, has steadfastly refused to step down since allegations were first raised in April in The Australian that white staff had painted substantial sections of Indigenous canvases in her studios.

Artists and studio staffers claimed Ms O’Meara herself painted on Indigenous canvases and directed other white studio staff to do the same to get the paintings “over the line” and up to a standard deemed good enough for a gallery exhibition or an ­expensive sale.

There were also allegations of bullying of artists and staff and money being used as a form of ­coercive control.

Ms O’Meara and the board have denied all allegations levelled against her and her organisation. She has also resisted calls from the industry to stand down as criticism mounted and the ­National Gallery of Australia postponed an exhibition of ­APYACC paintings destined for its major winter exhibition and the gallery launched its own investigation into the provenance of the paintings.

The boards of the four peak arts bodies, representing every Indigenous arts centre in the NT, SA and WA, and many thousands of artists, have all called upon Ms O’Meara to step aside.

To add to her woes, the industry’s watchdog, The Indigenous Art Code, which had conducted its own lengthy investigation into the APYACC, expelled the organisation from the Code – an industry sanction akin to a doctor being struck off the registrar.

The Westpac Foundation and the SA government have also put on ice $380,000 in annual funding the two benefactors had been funnelling into APYACC.

This week, Ms Michaels expressed frustration Ms O’Meara had not stood down and the board had not forced her to do so. She said she “suspected it would be more difficult” for the panel investigating the APYACC to do its job while she remained in the position “but I do not have the power to stand someone down”.

Ms Michaels said only the board could do that and its members would have to account for their actions. “They have to comply with directors’ duties … they’re responsible for ensuring (artists and staffers) have a safe workplace,” she said.

On Tuesday, the APYACC board said: “General manager Skye O’Meara has the full confidence of the board and artists of the APY Art Centre Collective.”