Summary
The painting depicts a sandbar and mudflats at low tide. The rarrk or crosshatched design is the foam and mud in the mangroves. The fruit from the marrnga, mangrove trees, has a poisonous fruit and if the sap from the tree comes into contact with the skin, it immediately produces swelling and great pain. The dead wood from these trees is burned and the coals mixed with water to produce use for a poultice on sores. The mangrove habitat supports menawu, shellfish, that were collected by the Djan'kawu Sisters, who carried them in their bathi, conical baskets, seen at the feet of the figure here. The painting is a segment of a larger epic story relating to the ancestral country of the artist, a place called Malwandra.
Physical Description
A single sheet of bark (Stringybark, Eucalytpus tetrodonta) painted with natural pigments.
More Information
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Object/Medium
Painting, bark
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Maker
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Cultural Groups
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Locality
Milingimbi, Eastern Arnhem Land, Northern Territory, Australia
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Date Produced
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Collector
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Date Collected
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Object Measurements
420 mm (Length), 150 mm (Width), 20 mm (Height)
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Keywords
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Collection Names
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Type of item
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Discipline
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Category
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Collecting Areas
Australian Indigenous - Northern Australia and Queensland and Torres Strait Islands