Artiste : Buwathay Munyarryun

Titre de l'œuvre : Mädi

Pigments naturels sur écorce

Format : 61 x 24 cm

Provenance et certificat original : centre d'art aborigène de Yirrkala

Référence de la peinture : 2938-18

© Photo : Aboriginal signature with the courtesy of the artist & Buku-Larrngay Mulka.

Explication de l’œuvre :

This bark Painting by Buwathay Munyarryun (1962), belongs to the Wangurri clan. This is recognised by the fact that miny’tji (sacred clan design- the detailed cross hatching ‘behind’ the figurative imagery) belonging to the Wangurri covers the piece. This piece shows disguised representations of a mangrove log washed in from saltwater Maŋgalili country into the Wangurri clan freshwater area of Gularri, the Cato River. Mädi is the female Rock Lobster. It contained Milka or mangrove worms which died once it washed into the fresh water.

is here repeated as the Wangurri sacred clan design which appears throughout. The songs of the Wangurri invest this log with sacred power allowing it to make paths that other beings and landscape features could follow.

It is also a representation of the ‘mangrove worm’ with its wood eating jaws shut. Here the log has completed a journey through the tidal interplay of fresh, salt and brackish to the fresh waters of Gularri near Dhalinybuy - the actual residence of

the artist and homeland for the Waŋgurri. The log also has reference to the canoe used by the ancestral hunters who were the first Maŋgalili people to die, having drowned at sea, and the hollow log used for final mortuary rites.

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