Lanyirrda (“Billy”) circa 1925-1975

Natural earth pigments on eucalyptus bark

Acquired from the artist at Mudjinberri (Mudjinbardi) by Lance Bennett, in 1966
The Thomas Vroom Collection, The Netherlands

Theme Park - Brook Andrew, AAMU, Utrecht, 17 October 2008 - 1 April 2009

No repairs or restoration. There are some very minor areas of pigment loss, the lower margin has suffered from emersion in water at some point, and there are some fraying and cracks along the lower edge.
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Lance Bennett’s accompanying documentation reads in part, “Namarnde is general term for the various spirits which inhabit the vast rocky Arnhem Land plateau, a region which the Aborigines call ‘The Stone Country’.

In the heat of the day, these spirits live in cool rocky holes. At night, namarnde emerge to leap, run and gambol about.

‘The old people’ (past generations) often saw these spirits, and later painted their likeness either on rock faces or on the interior walls of their bark huts.

The artist has here shown a male and female narmande. The female is wearing a pubic apron made of a folded piece of paperbark held in place with bush string (spun from strips of bark from the Banyan tree).

This bark was painted for Bennett during one of his visits to the small Aboriginal community on Mudjinberri cattle station, between the South and East Alligator Rivers, in the dry season of 1966.