Artiste : Jack Nawilil

Titre de l'œuvre : Ngalkodjek (daluk) woman ceremonial object

Paperbark (Melaleuca Quinquenervia) with Natural Dyes

Format : 176x8x8cm

Référence de la peinture : 978-19

Explications pour cette œuvre :
The following information comes from an interview with Jack Nawilil transcribed by linguists Murray Garde and Margaret Carew in December 2017. The narratives represented in Nawilil’s artworks are extremely complex and often antithetical to Western knowledge systems. His artworks reference and manifest multiple places, clans and events that span vast distances and timeframes. To audiences who are not initiated and socialised in the local practices and history, the true and complete meaning of these artworks cannot be fully grasped. His artworks challenge the viewer to grapple with a different way of being in, and understanding, the world.

This one here [ceremonial object], I have drawn my own personal designs on it. This represents a woman, she travelled a long way, all the way from Elcho Island. This ceremonial object is one of the women, her name is Ngalkodjek. She came this way, to the west from north-east Arnhem Land. She has many things: kunkaninj (digging stick) that she walked with across the land, and kunmadj (dilly bags). She named and created the country as she walked.

There is another one however. Same story, but it is a different one and represents a food plant, it’s from the saltwater country. In my country at Koenidjangka way. I made the plant food emblem, and the name of that plant is manbingkanj. It is a sacred thing from the Mardayin ceremony, but I have adapted it to make it a secular version. This thing here, I made it, this object is called karlanj and it represents a plant food, manme.

© Photo Aboriginal signature with the courtesy of the artist & Maningrida Arts
© Text : Maningrida Arts

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