MAWALAN MARIKA | THE SEAGULL

Collected by Dr. Stuart Scougall in Yirrkala, North East Arnhem Land, 1962

Qantas Gallery, New York, 1963 (Painting No.19 in catalogue)

Private Collection, New York, acquired from the above in 1963

Sotheby’s, Important Aboriginal Art, Melbourne, 25 July 2005, lot 69

Fiona Brockhoff, Melbourne

Scougall, S. and P.C. Gifford, 'Aboriginal Art and Mythology', in Natural History Magazine, Journal of the American Museum of Natural History, Vol. LXXIV (2), February, 1965, illus.pp. 46-8.

Qantas Gallery, New York, Australian Aboriginal Art, March - April 1963 (cat. no. 19)

Cf. For a similar composition by Mawalan's eldest daughter and pupil, Banygul Marika (born 1939), see Hollow Log Mortuary Ceremony, 1962, in the collection of the National Gallery of Australia, illus. in the exhibition brochure Ancestors and Spirits: Aboriginal Painting from Arnhem Land in the 1950s and 1960s, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, 1987.

For similar paintings of ceremonies by Mawalan Marika, see: Perkins, H., Tradition Today: Indigenous Art in Australia, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 2004, p. 79; and Ruhe, E.L., Australian Bark Painting, Oakland University, Rochester, Michigan, October 1975 (exhibition cat). For details of the seagull’s importance in ritual, see Elkin, A.P., Catherine and Ronald Berndt, 1959, Art in Arnhem Land, University of Chicago Press p. 88.

The Seagull 1962

The painting was collected by Dr. Stuart Scougall who, with Tony Tuckson of the Art Gallery of New South Wales, played a major role in the recognition of Aboriginal art through the acquisition and gift of bark paintings from Yirrkala and carvings from the Tiwi Islands to the Art Gallery of New South Wales in 1959. Mawalan Marika was not only an outstanding artist but a key figure in recent Yolngu history. Mawalan as leader of the Rirratjingu clan gave the Reverend Wilbur Chaseling permission to set up the first mission station in Eastern Arnhem land at Yirrkala in 1935. Mawalan was one of the Yolngu clan leaders who campaigned for the recognition of their rights by the Australian government eventually resulting in the Aboriginal land rights (Northern Territory Act) 1976. Yolngu saw art as a way of sharing the richness of their culture with outsiders and gaining recognition for their rights. The Seagull is a magnificent example of Mawalan’s art. The painting represents the ceremonies associated with Ngurula, the seagull. Ngurula connects clans of the Dhuwa moiety together flying from one clan’s country to another. The painting is set in Rirratjingu country showing the seas between Yirrkala and the island of Dhambaliya. The top section of the painting evokes the seagulls’ determined flight across the sea with fish swimming below in the sparkling waters. The right-hand section with its patterned serenity and elegance is in deliberate contrast to the left-hand panel where the seagull turns and the fish scatter. The lower half illustrates a mortuary ritual that commemorates the seagull and links clans together. On a person’s death a small ceremonial object was made of a carved seagull’s head with a body and wings made from feather string.1 This could be used as a message stick announcing the death. Later on a memorial ceremony is held in which lengths of feather string are hung from a ceremonial pole representing the spirit’s journey and men and women dance in memory of the dead. The central section shows the songman seated with clap sticks held high and the yidaki (digeridoo) player using a sheet of bar as a resonator, while people dance around. The seagull with strings segmenting the lower panel represents the pole, the sacred object and the journey connecting the clans. The songs are still sung in Yolngu ceremonies and great lengths of white feather strings are held by dancers in a line joining people together and marking Ngurula’s journey. The background pattern represents the clan design of the Rirratjingu clan.

1 For details see Elkin, A.P., Catherine and Ronald Berndt, 1959, Art in Arnhem Land, University of Chicago Press page 88.

Howard Morphy, 2019