• 2. Pupuni Jilamara
  • 2. Pupuni Jilamara
  • 2. Pupuni Jilamara

Shania Puruntatamerri

2. Pupuni Jilamara

  

 “I use natural ochre, always crush the yellow and white rock, then cook it up and make it red. That’s why the design of my painting looks really traditional. Natural. We just collect it from the island. The white one we collect from the beach, the big cliff. The yellow rock we collect inland when we’re passing by, traveling to other communities or hunting place…middle of the bush near the rock, we collect the yellow bright rocks.”

 

  • Ochre on Canvas, stretched
  • 150cm x 80cm 
  • Cat 23-97

During ceremony on the Tiwi Islands a series of 'yoi' (dances), are performed; some are totemic (inherited from the person's Mother) and some serve to act out the narrative of newly composed songs.

Participants in these ceremonies are painted with turtiyanginari (the different natural ochre colours) in varying designs, transforming the dancers and, in some cases, providing protection against recognition by mapurtiti (spirits).

These designs can be applied in different ways. Ochre is applied to the body and face. These significant artistic designs collectively are called 'Jilamara'.

Shania Puruntatamerri is an artist working with Munupi Arts in Pirlangimpi, Melville Island. Her dance is the Buffulo. 

Munupi Arts & Crafts Association is located along Melville Island's north-western coastline at Pirlangimpi (Garden Point) and is the most recently formed art centre on the Tiwi Islands. In 1990 the Yikikini Women’s Centre and Pirlangimpi Pottery were incorporated under the name Munupi Arts and Crafts Association giving local artists an opportunity to proudly celebrate Tiwi culture through both traditional and contemporary mediums.
 
For 25 years Munupi Arts has been a vital meeting place for the Tiwi people of the Pirlangimpi community for employment, cultural pride and well being.
Munupi Art is wholly indigenous owned and governed. Generated income supports the artist's families and therefore the whole Tiwi community. 

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