Sourced from from the National Gallery of Victoria archive, James Davidson states:
Mathaman’s people refer to themselves as the Yulgnor (The People) and there are no tribes as such in Arnhem Land. The social structure consists of two moieties: the Dhuwa and the Yirritja. The moieties are made up of a number of clans and the leader of each clan has a place on the council of elders. Wives have a say through their husbands.
In this area on the shores of the Arafura Sea and the Gulf of Carpentaria the Yulgnor have lived for thousands of years, performing their great ceremonies based on the lives of their spirit ancestors, some of whom came ‘in the time before morning from behind the sunrise’. The sun was Walu, the wife of Djanggawul, and she sent out banners of light to show the Djanggawul the way to Djalangbara where the Djanggawul landed among the sand-dunes. These beings ‘made’ the country and the people for the clans of the Dhuwa moiety, and Nggapililinggu ‘made’ the country and the people for the Yirritja moiety; the lesser Barama came out of the sea distributing the totems for Yirritja clans. The Wawaluk sisters journeyed singing through the land, touching flora and fauna with their sacred yam sticks and claiming them as totems for the Dhuwa moiety. As they claimed the various totems they chanted the sacred or ‘inside’ name of the totem. These sacred names are closely guarded by the old men and never uttered in the presence of the uninitiated.
The natural ochre pigment has been finely applied with a blade of grass and there is some pigment loss due to it’s housing in the back shed. Over the years to date there has been no further deterioration in this intricate Cycad Tree depiction.
This painting was found at the back of Nambara Arts near Nhulunbuy in far North East Arnhem Land. The canvas had been sliced so I sent it to a Melbourne conservationist for repair and can be seen expertly consolidated on the reverse. Helen Read 2024
This painting was shown in the ‘A Thousand Journeys’ travelling exhibition curated by Tin Sheds Gallery University of Sydney.Tin Sheds, Gallery, University of Sydney, 27 March to 18 April 1998 Itinerary 1998 – 2001
Tamworth City Gallery, 3 July to 9 August, 1998
Newcastle City Gallery, 4 November to 13 December 1998
Albury Regional Art Centre, 9 April to 9 May 1999
Mornington Peninsula Regiona Gallery, 6 June to 18 July 1999
Ballarat Fine Art Gallery, 30 July to 10 September 1999
Mildura Arts Centre, 15 October to 14 November 1999
Bathurst Regional Gallery,
Flinders University Art Museum, 24 February to 17 March 2001