Art museum acquisitions
by Erica Green
With
planning for the new Art Museum gallery now under way at the Landmark
building at UniSA’s City West campus, it would be easy to overlook the
Art Museum’s other key role – managing the development of the
University’s own art collection. It’s an activity that impacts visually
across the campuses, with works of art regularly displayed in key
locations.
Now and then the exciting opportunity arises to buy new works of art for the collection. It’s a task carried out in consultation with the divisions and an Art Museum acquisitions committee recommends the works of art acquired in accordance with University Art Collection policy. Sometimes the works are specially commissioned from artists and sometimes they are donated.
Most
recently a generous donation from AMP funded the purchase of two important
bark paintings by celebrated Indigenous contemporary artists – Djambawa
Marawilli and Wyan Wanambi (Dundiwuy) – both from Yirrkala in North East
Arnhem land.
Marawilli (b.1953) received a prestigious Telstra Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island award for bark painting in 1996. He paints the sacred dugong, crocodile and snake dreaming, and represents “Bäru”, the ancestral crocodile man who is thought to have brought fire to the Madarrpa country. In Sacred dugong, crocodile and snake dreamings (1984), Marawilli has used diamond-shaped patterns to represent the presence of Bäru and the burns he received from the ancestral fire. The painting tells the story of how Bäru descended into the sea to heal his wounds at the dreaming place of the dugong, where he remains today.
Wanambi (1936 - 1992) painted in the Gurka’wuy and Trial Bay areas that surround the Marrakulu clan country. In Wild honey spirit man and possum dreamings (1984), Wanambi depicts the ancient creation myth of the wild honey spirit man (Wuyal) who fells the mangrove tree at Gurka’wuy with his stone axe to reach honey from a bee’s nest. The honey flows from the felled tree, permeating the ground and creating the river Gurka’wuy, the ceremonial ground for the Marrakulu clan in Trial Bay.
These significant bark paintings are now on display at Magill campus.
For more information on the Art Museum, contact Erica Green, Director, or Cherie Prosser, Collection and Curatorial Assistant on (08) 8302 0870 or visit www.unisa.edu.au/samstagmuseum