The University of Melbourne is the custodian of a rare collection of thirty-six bark paintings from the Aboriginal people of Groote Eylandt, a small island off the east coast of Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory. Produced during the 1930s and 1940s, the bark paintings are among the earliest representations of the painting style of the Warnindilyakwa people. Collected by Fredrick Grey, an anthropologist living on Groote Eylandt at the time, the works were donated to the university in 1946. The works show graphic depictions of animal totems, ceremony, creation narratives, geographical mapping and historical events (in particular the interaction with Maccassan traders) against stark black and yellow backgrounds.
In addition to these rich insights into Warnindilyakwa culture and the beauty of these early paintings, this exhibition also offers an opportunity to consider the role of trade in the production of visual material; trade activities, such as those present on Groote Eylandt in the early twentieth century, are an historical precedent for a system of exchange that underlies some contemporary Indigenous art practice.
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