Title

Working with Aboriginal communities.

Author

Fox, Steve

Details

Sixth Australian Print Symposium, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, 2007

Publication date

2007

Type

Conference paper

Language

English

Country of context

Australia

Full text

Working with Aboriginal communities.
by Steve Fox

28 YEARS IN 15 MIN………the Accidental Printmaker (some times working with Aboriginal communities)

15 minutes is a short time for me to rabbit on about a few things that have happened in my life with printmaking but I will give it a go. I have a series of images here that tell a bit of the story of part of my life that has been involved with Aboriginal communities starting in Yirrkala in 1979, this talk is supposed to be based on imparting knowledge, I think I would rather see it as a sharing of experiences

• This first image taken outside Yirrkala Arts & Crafts around 1980 (this building still forms the basic structure of the Art Centre now known as Buku Larrngay Mulka but has had some radical face lifts over time)
Artist & friend LumaLuma 2 his wife Bolgnu holding my daughter Annelise, Mike O’Ferral who I took over from as Art Co-ordinator & Chris McGuigan who was the first Co-ordinator around 1975, the little Kid is Possum Mike’s daughter

• My core responsibility was to promote & market the work of the Artists from Yirrkala and its surrounding homelands, I was told very early that I was here to promote the work of the Artists of the area not to tell people what to do

_painting by Wakuthi Marrawili
_painting by Baluka Maymuru
_carving by Witji Witji Wunungmurra
_small carving by Naminupu Maymuru & Gaymala Yunupingu

• There where many younger women making these small carvings at the time but the financial return was limited, one Artist in particular Yilila would do quite detailed images over her small carvings
I introduced her to woodblock printing, Sat mornings in the back of the gallery, not changing her style, and not changing how she cut her designs these were still done with the same single edge razor blade used to decorate carving
I think this was the start of my belief in using appropriate technology and getting the basic skills down so that when as a art-coordinator you left, as most of us white fella’s do for one reason or another what you started has the chance of continuing on
These are three images from that time, Yilila printed editions of these and they were sold through Cooee in Sydney around 1982

_Baru print
_Wayin & Mokuy
_scene from Wilama
This last one was one of my favourites telling a story of Yilila’s husband catching kingfish
Yilila was invited up to the top school by teachers like Jim McManus and Joan Wurn who actively promoted the teaching of printmaking in those days

• There was this old man Narritjin Maymuru that became my mentor for the first couple of years, he taught me much about the paintings and carvings but more so about its connection to country (something strong in truly great Art)…what he never told me about I only found this out after his death he had created what was probably the first prints from a Yirrkala Artist

_ these two etchings were created with Jorg Schmeisser while visiting Canberra & ANU as a Creative Arts Fellow in 1978
This old mans creative legacy continues on today through his brothers daughter Naminapu Maymuru White who has created many great prints and her brothers daughter Araluen or Naminapu 2 who now works as the Print Curator/Printer in the print workshop at Yirrkala
_ An Old Friend Dies Before His Time this is a print of mine from 1987 based on the tragic circumstance of the old man’s death in 1981

• I left Yirrkala in mid 1984, worked part time at the SA School of Art in the Printmaking Dept, but during this time I landed a job to put together a screen printing workshop at the Jerry Mason Senior Memorial Centre in Glossop up in the riverland in SA. This was an intensive 17 week workshop, from the ground up even constructing a dark room in an old transportable, printing w/shop & studio. One of the most successful students from that workshop was Ian Abdulla who has gone on to great acclaim as a painter, having worked alongside John Kean at Tandanya in Adelaide and later being supported by Paul Greenaway until today through Greenaway Gallery in Adelaide
_one of Ians fist prints at the workshop 1988
_pic of Ians country you can see where his images come from
_one of Ian’s first prints from the workshop of his Mother 1988
_a later print commissioned by Paul Greenaway printed by Basil Hall from Basil Hall Editions in Darwin (that man pops up throughout my story today – he gets around)
_instead of a photo of that w/shop here’s Ians version from 2003

• Another job I landed around this time was to run a two week workshop at the Cadell Training Centre in the riverland to create a screenprinted poster to foster Aids awareness amongst Aboriginal inmates. Again using an old kitchen the students/inmates constructed their own screens and designed and printed some 200 posters in 3 colours their first ever foray into printmaking. They were all pretty pleased with themselves and this led to me being employed for a year every Friday to continue the W/Shop
_original poster the guys printed
_a second poster they were commissioned as the w/shop continued
_one of the guys prints this one was a big hit with everyone
_at this time Streetwize Comics in Sydney were asking for images to be printed in their kinda Anti- Bi Centenary Issue, we sent some images over one guy got his print on the back cover he was particularly proud of that (story about the screws being a little upset at the time about that image)

• after that job Yirrkala came beckoning again, the Art Centre was in a bit of strife so my partner, my kids and I packed up and went North again, so from 1990-93 it was back to being the Art Coordinator again.

_one of the first good things to happen was arranging Gaymala Yunupingu first solo exhibition at AGOG, Helen Maxwell’s gallery in Kingston, while we were there we met Basil Hall who was operating Studio 1 above Helen’s Gallery and I think he said why don’t you come upstairs see if Gaymal would like to make a print
_completely undaunted by the process Gaymala did two Litho’s that day, in this case the printing was another thing this was done by Jan Hogan who I believe has a show on right now of drawings, litho’s, artists books & video at Foyer Gallery of ANU School of Art
_At this time I began working a lot closer with Marrnyula Mununggurr, she had a very unique style of painting,
_we were approached by NT Conservation Commission to get an image up on the destruction by pigs in the environment, Marrnyula did this wonderful painting that was then printed up by Redback Graphix around 1990
_we had also been approached by the Health Dept in Nhulunbuy through my partner Lil who worked as the Aids & STD Educator to see if there was an Artist whose work would transpose well into a printed poster. Marrnyula jumped to the task and this painting and poster was created in 1993. Marrnyula together with Araluen now run the print workshop at Yirrkala, these are some of her recent prints
_just before I came back Nami had been down South and worked with Theo Tremblay (I think at studio one)on this wonderful print NYAPILINGU a three part lino cut 138 x 20cm, one of my first jobs was just to get a payment through so that the editioning could happen, once printed the edition sold out in no time
_a more recent image Nami last year with her work at Bandagan Gallery in Sydney at the opening with Raymatja

• These next couple of images are from a sad time the death of four people in a helicopter crash including the pilot Adrian Wagg. These photo’s are from his funeral the first time such an honor has been placed on a white fella but such was the respect Yolngu had for this man after he had worked for around 25 years with this mob.
I show you these because while I was there for the funeral Naminapu #1 gave me a gift of her latest print, the images in her print connect to this ceremony, to new life and to death and to this man as he had been adopted into the Mangalili Clan also connecting him back to Narritjin and even his first print of the possum the string from his fur bound around the top of the burial pole.

_this is an image of Buku Larrngay in more recent time within the courtyard is the Yirrkala printworkshop, back in 1993 after much discussion and particularly with Naminapu #1 interest in printmaking and the Art Centre in general we secured a huge grant from ATSIC to get these new editions to that very old building you saw at the start. Unfortunately I took off before any building started so it took a lot of hard work by my the coordinator that followed me, Andrew Blake along with the Artists of Yirrkala to make the building happen. Andrews wife Dianne an Artist as well worked with Artists in particular Marrnyula who in turned trained with Basil Hall (then in Darwin with Northern Editions……there he is again) to make the print making centre a place where Yolngu could do the editions
_Marrnyula in w/shop
_Marrnyula and Nami in W/shop

_last are some prints from Yirrkala Printshop some printed by Naminapu #2 the old mans grand daughter including her own print based on mats and bathi woven by women of NE Arnhemland
_image of Araluen at a recent graduation with Nuwaniny who now works alongside Araluen

• Up until Easter last year for the past nine years I have been working as the Director of Maruku Arts out at Uluru
_this is a photograph of my bosses the governing committee taken around 2004

_we would travel all over the Central Desert region visiting member communities out there collecting all the wooden carvings for Maruku’s gallery, such as Nyarapi Giles work from Tjukurla in WA
_ I have been watching that man again Basil Hall now of Basil Hall Editions running some great workshops in the bush, particularly at Ernabella in the far north of SA.
_I have delighted in the images he has printed by Nura Rupert such as this print Camela, I have heard two stories for this print …one it is an early explorer Nura saw on a camel travelling through the Musgrave ranges and secondly Nura on a camel with wild hair…….whatever I luv it

• That brings me to the final part of this story I now have my own gallery MOGO RAW ART and BLUES down on the south coast its success is coming from many fantastic relationships I have developed with many Artists and Aboriginal Communities also from my time at Art School way back and my stretch as Director for three and a half years of 24HR Art in Darwin
Life is great, I have a fantastic show opening Good Friday with work by Nura Rupert of Ernabella mainly paintings but also some prints (if they turn up) editioned by that man again Basil seems like I can’t shake that fella

• finally the last print I made STILL GURRKA PINK it’s a funny print about an insult that would be yelled at you by some drunken person, use to put ya back into your place, that mob up at Yirrkala put us all through some business one day …….it was a gift to show the strength of Yolngu culture……..it does not make you Aboriginal as some would believe
Its an honour that’s all…….THANK YOU

© Steve Fox
MOGO RAW ART and BLUES
Upstairs, 15 Princes Highway, MOGO NSW 2536
PH 02 447 446 22 Email: sfox@octa4.net.au

Paper presented at the Sixth Australian Print Symposium, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, 2007

 

Last Updated

13 Aug 2012