Item - Waterspouts

ID UNSW BP 1989/0480 (082496)
Artist George LIWUKANG BUKURLATJPI (c. 1927 - )
Title Waterspouts
Alternate Titles
Category Painting
Medium bark
Materials ochres on eucalyptus bark
Edition Number
Measurements (cms)  
  Height 74.00
  Width 47.50
  Depth 0.00
  Other Box frame: 104 x 76 x 9.5 cms
Marks/Inscriptions  
  Location
  Signed not signed
Produced  
  When 1976
  Where Australia, NT, Elcho Island
Style NE Arnhem Land
Subject Waterscape
Credit Line Presented by Professor John Cawte through the Australian Government's Taxation Incentives for the Arts Scheme, 1989
Description/Remarks    Depicts three waterspouts rising from three circles at base of image; set against interwoven pattern of wide bands in cross-hatch pattern (rarrk). Bunches of sea-anemones appear on the side borders of image. "A waterspout is the urinary system or sometimes the fishing spear of the cloud giant, Djambawul the Thunderman. Liwukan has painted this version of the story granted to him through his mother. It is a Marchinbar (Wessel Islands) design, as shown by the curved hatching, which represents the northwest monsoon, and by the sea-anemones, which are turtle food. The tripartite division of the column of the waterspout corresponds with modern photographic evidence." (from John Cawte's "The Universe of the Warramirri")
Exhibition History
Bibliography John Cawte AO The Universe of the Warramirri: Art, Medicine and Religion in Arnhem Land NSW University Press, Kensington, NSW, Australia, 1993,, pg.62; ill.pg. 63
ISBN 0 86840 013 0

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