Aboriginal Contemporary Gallery, in association with Bana Yirriji Art Centre, proudly presents,
Dikal, Mili & Kiju: New Paintings from Wujal Wujal
We are excited about our forthcoming exhibition in Sydney featuring Lila Creek, Anne Nunn, Josie Olbar and emerging artist Doreen Collins.
DETAILS
Aboriginal Contemporary Gallery
254 Bronte Road, Waverley NSW 2024
Opens 3rd December 2022.
For more information: https://www.aboriginalcontemporary.com.au/
ABOUT
In Far North Queensland, situated by the spectacular Bloomfield River, is the community of Wujal Wujal, home of the Bana Yirriji Art Centre. The Art Centre represents artists from the Eastern Kuku-Yalanji nation, including the Kuku- Nyungkal and Kuku-Jalunji warra (clans).
The artists are freshwater and saltwater people and draw inspiration from their Country, located in the World Heritage-listed Great Barrier Reef and Wet Tropics areas.
This innovative group of creatives love to paint animals and plants from the rainforest and ocean and relish experimenting with various media. They recently began painting with locally sourced earth and commercial pigments resulting in a stunningly unique palette.
Aboriginal Contemporary first came across Bana Yirriji Art Centre’s unique artworks last year, and we have been working to bring them to Sydney ever since. Dikal, Mili & Kiju: Birds, Jellyfish & Crabs is both our gallery’s first-ever partnership with a Far North Queensland art centre and Bana Yirriji Art Centre’s first exhibition with a commercial gallery.
The show brings together the work of four artists. Lila Creek, a senior artist with twenty-one grandchildren and thirty-nine great-grandchildren, captures the camouflaged subtlety of rainforest owls in gestural, enigmatic portraits. Anne Nunn tells ancient stories of birds of wetlands in Nyungkal Country, such as the statuesque kubal (brolga). Josie Olbar is a Jalanji saltwater woman who tells tales of Mili; the stinging jellyfish passed down from her ancestors. And Doreen Collins, who learnt traditional weaving from her mother’s family in Arnhem Land, captures the very essence of the simple dilly bag used to carry bush foods such as mud crabs.
‘Dikal, Mili and’Kiju’ is a sublime narration of life in Wujal Wujal. Cultural threads woven into renderings of local wildlife carrying ancient and profound knowledge of Country. This unique collection of works celebrates the customs of Bama (people) with a mesmerising palette and pictorial playfulness, each artist leaving a lasting impression of life from this unique region in Far North Queensland. Text courtesy Aboriginal Contemporary
Images © Bana Yirrji Art Centre. Photos Edwina Circuitt