Artiste : Tina Patlas

Titre de l'œuvre : Kulama

Pigments naturels sur toile de lin Belge

Format : 120 × 90 cm

Provenance et certificat : centre d'art aborigène de Jalimara (Tiwi Island)

Référence de la peinture : 11-24

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© Photo : Aboriginal signature with the courtesy of the artist & Jilamara Art centre (Tiwi Island)

Explications sur cette œuvre :

Tina Patlas (1968) began painting for Jilamara Arts and Craft Association in 2002. Although Tina’s traditional country spans areas of south west Melville Island and south east Bathurst Island (including Wurrumiyanga) she spent most of her youth growing up in Milikapiti on the north coast of the island.

Tina works in the local community for Territory Housing but has also painted at the art centre for many years. She held the position as Treasurer of the Jilamara Arts and Craft Association Executive Committee in 2003.

Tina paints her own Jilamara design about country, yoi (ceremonial dance), Kulama ceremony and the wildlife of the Tiwi Islands. She has a special interest in the parlini jilamara, the old stories handed down by her ancestors.

When she was growing up, she watched her Grandfather Holder Adams paint and carve where he lived at Timrambu – just south of Milikapiti. She says, “He used to sculpt toys for us to play with. This inspired me to become an artist.”

This artwork is dealing about Kulama. It is the Tiwi coming of age ceremony which coincides with the harvest of wild yam. The ceremony is performed late in the wet season when a ring or halo appears around Japarra (the moon). Elders of both sexes sing and call out to the ancestors for three days, welcoming children into adulthood. The ceremony is held on a prepared ground of concentric circles at the centre of which round yams are prepared for ea􀆟ng. Circular motifs in Tiwi art often symbolise the moon, yam and ritual circles of the Kulama ceremony, the pwanga (dots) reflect the japalinga (stars).

As Tiwi artist and cultural leader Pedro Wonaeamirri describes:

Japarra ( moon), warnarringa (sun) and the circles on the ground all important for Kulama. Three days and nights – Friday, Saturday and Sunday are the ceremony. No li􀆩le children at the Kulama. No dancing, just calling out to the ancestors, each direc􀆟on. This way, that way. Just singing, calling out and crawling in a circle calling out and sharing stories from parlingarri [old 􀆟mes]. At the end of the Kulama, on Sunday we eat, then Monday morning everyone comes in, the children and old people. The cooked yam is mixed with red ochre and put on their bodies. Some􀆟mes people have one side of yam for ea􀆟ng and one side for mixing with red ochre and rubbing on the body – Pedro Wonaeamirri.