JACK KARADADA
1918-2003, AustraliaThe Karadada family of the north-west Kimberley region of Western Australia provides a unique lineage of artists who dedicated their artistic practice almost exclusively to the image of the Wanjina. Jack, his wife Lily Mindildi, and his brother Lewis, and Lewis’s wife Rosie Ngalirman were members of the Wunambal-speaking peoples that occupied the country between the Prince Regent River and the King Edward River. Their late brother, Manila Karadada (Kutwit), had been one of the foremost painters of Wanjina during the renaissance of north Kimberley art that occurred in the mid 1970s.
As anthropologist Kim Akerman previously observed, ‘Jack’s Wanjina figures can usually be distinguished from those of other artists by several features including the eyes that usually abut each other, separated only by a nose that is reduced to a stroke of the brush.’ The stick-like figures surrounding this Wanjina may represent a human baby-spirit, yayalla. These spirits are said to inhabit areas of permanent fresh water usually also associated with both Wanjina beings and rainbow serpents.
Text by Luke Scholes. Courtesy D Lan Gallerlies
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