THE BODY TIWI: WATCH THIS SPACE

Photograph Roy Pope Mellville Island 1941

CONTEXT

In the early 1990s the University of Tasmania’s School of Art initiated an Aboriginal Artist in Residence project and was funded to host two Tiwi artists. They were from Melville Island and the relatively new art centre at Milikapiti on Melville Island, ‘Jilamara Arts and Crafts'.

The project was to produce two Pukumani poles for the university’s art collection and by example and interaction with students and the wider community generate better and more inclusive understandings of Aboriginal cultural realities. Something they delivered in spades!

The residency led to an exhibitiuon in the University Gallery entitled THE BODY TIWI that included works from the Jilamara Arts and Crafts.

It turned out that these artists presence in Launceston sparked a memory of a 1941 visit to Melville Island top a community then known as Garden Point, now known as Pirlangimpi.

Roy Pope, a Launceston resident visited Melville Is while on leave when he was stationed in Darwin with the RAAF. Coincidently he had a 35mm camera with him and as chance sometimes has it he shot several rolls of film and recorded ordinary life on the island.

Amongst his photographs there is documentation of a Pukamani ceremony. The task in hand now is to make these images more accessible made as they were in somewhat extraordinary circumstances.

Roy might well have been preceded by Baldwin Spencer in 1911/12 yet his images have a certain poignancy and they deserve more attention than they have received since coming to light a quarter of a century ago.

Friday, July 24, 2020

WATCH THIS SPACE

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