Atop a large rock, a man watches another man and woman make camp

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Type: Bark paintings
Place: Groote Eylandt, Northern Territory, Australia
Materials: Bark, Metal - non specific, Pigment
Collection: Peter Redlich collection no. 1
Accession number: 1986.0112.0033

Description

Ochres on bark, metal hangers. Painting depicts 2 big dotted rocks, 1 on each side, divided by dotted wavy lines. On top of left rock is sitting a human figure with spear. Inside a shelter at top right are two human figures. Black background. Artist: Unknown. Location: Groote Eylandt, NT.

About the collection

This collection of ninety-four objects comprises three boomerangs, a club, two spearthrowers, two fire sticks, a hollow wooden smoking pipe, two ceremonial poles, six spears, seven spearheads, three model wood dugout canoes, one model wood canoe, a didjeridu and forty-one bark paintings. All but two of the paintings are from Groote Eylandt, N T. The remaining paintings and objects are from Yirrkala, N T. A self-confessed "ardent" collector of Aboriginal art and associate of anthropologist, lawyer, collector and curator, Dr Leonhard Adam, Ernst Redlich acquired this collection by "mail order", circa 1956, from Reverend Allan G Rankine, then Superintendent of the Methodist Overseas Mission, Yirrkala N T. In a letter to Rankine, Redlich had stressed his desire to collect "very old" art works; in his reply, Rankine explained that the bark paintings themselves were not old, but were produced "mainly… by old men" who painted the stories of their "ancient legends". The collection was donated to the National Museum by his wife, Josephine Redlich, and son, Peter Redlich, in 1986. The largest island in the Gulf of Carpentaria, Groote Eylandt lies approximately fifty kilometers off the Northern Territory mainland, opposite Blue Mud Bay and is the homeland of the Anindilyakwa people. Groote Eylandt art, like other Aboriginal art, reflected and illustrated everyday life as well as being a repository of sacred and symbolic meaning. The paintings in this collection depict recurring Groote Eylandt subjects, which include ancestral beings and creation spirits, totemic winds, humans, land and marine animals, birds and landscapes. Like most bark painting, Groote Eylandt bark art is highly illustrative and concerned with narrative. However, unlike mainland Arnhem Land art, Groote Eylandt art is distinctive because of its relatively minimalist style portraying red, yellow or red ochred figurative or abstract representations against a black manganese-based, occasionally red or yellow, ochred background. To prepare the bark for painting, strips were cut from a stringy-bark tree and the flaky parts stripped. After curing by smoking over a fire, the bark was alternately buried in sand and exposed to sunlight before being cut into the required shape and size. The surface was rubbed with the juice of a local plant, which acted as an adhesive. After a light coating of ochre, coloured ochres were applied with fine brushes made from human hair or fibrous bark. This collection also includes several paintings by Yolngu artist Mungurrawuy Yunipingu. In contrast to Groote Eylandt art, Yolngu art is composed of formalized and prescribed geometric designs which incorporate multiple layers of meaning. Complex figurative and symbolic design effects are achieved through use of cross-hatching or rrark, and many patterns derive from ancestral stories and ceremonies.

Read live from the Museum's Collection API (12/11/2026, 5:44:35 am). Record last updated by the Museum 2025-02-23. Licence: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/.