Jilamara Arts on Melville Island, Tiwi Islands states: “Freda was born around 1928 in the bush on her own country Mirrikawuyanga on Melville Island.
Catholic Missionaries raised Freda after she was taken from her parents. She did not know her age and may even have been born later than 1923. She remembered being at Pirlangimpi on Melville Island during the Second World War and hiding from the planes as they flew over to bomb Darwin.
Freda lived on Bathurst Island until she moved to Milikapiti on Melville Island about 1970 when her husband Alvin John Burunjamidi and her brother-in-law were working at the local sawmill. She had 4 children: her first child Linus was born in 1950 and her youngest Pamela was born in 1963.
Her painting experience was specific to painting for ceremonies until 1996 when she had the opportunity to paint on canvas and paper at Jilamara, and later printmaking. Her own style of art was very influenced by watching her father and the designs he created painting on ceremonial pukumani poles.
The late artist’s work has been exhibited throughout Australia and abroad, and is represented in national and international collections.
Freda was a woman of seeming contradiction. Both forceful and frail, her strength of spirit belied her petite physical appearance and age. Her paintings too are something more than they appear to be. Their vitality and exuberant energy give the impression of spontaneity in application, but fascinating to watch was her slow, carefully applied, deliberate methodical strokes. Her compositions of dots, lines, blocks of colour had over time become a particularly minimal design with the focus turning to the rhythm, movement, and energy of mulypinyini (line) interspersed with her ‘wildflower’ (Japartinga – tree orchid) – a delicate small blossom which grows in the bush during dry season – which is how she described her pwanga (dots).
Freda’s work has been exhibited internationally. Her artwork has been aquired by the NGV, MAGNT, The John McBride Collection (Melbourne & Toyko), Art Gallery of NSW, Artbank (Sydney), NGA & the Kerry Stokes Collection (Perth). Source: Jilamara Arts & Crafts
In a brief conversation between Helen Read and the artist, Freda Warlapinni, at Jilamara Arts, Milikapiti, 20 July 1998:
HR: Can you tell me anything about the painting?
FW: My father bin making him like that.
HR: What does it mean?
FW: Copied my father.
HR: Is it body painting design or design on wood? What is the pattern for?
FW: Painted for ceremony. To paint on the body. Used the same ochres.
This work was included in ‘A Thousand Journeys’ Travelling Exhibition Itinerary 1998 – 2001
Tin Sheds, Gallery, University of Sydney, 27 March to 18 April 1998
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
Northern Wings. Burra Regional Gallery, SA. February 16th – March 17th 2018