Untitled

synthetic polymer paint on Belgian linen

91 x 71 cm

$1,600

Provenance: Warnayaka Art Centre, Lajamanu, NT
Exhibited: Desert Mob, Araluen Arts Centre, Alice Springs, NT, October 2005 Butcher Shop Cafe, Mudgee NSW, 2005
Artwork story: This work was painted by Abie Jangala when assisted in his old age by his grandson Tony Sampson. Born at Thompson’s Rockhole in the Tanami Desert, Abie Jangala was initiated in to Warlpiri Law and inherited his father’s responsibility for the essential Rainmaking and Water Dreamings of this vast and arid desert area. Abie began working at the Granites copper mines, where he first learnt English and became familiar with European ways. During the early 1990s Adrian Newstead entered into a representative relationship with Abie Jangala through his Coo-ee Aboriginal Art Gallery in Sydney. This relationship lasted until Abie’s death, including the short periods during which the art centre was resurrected. Through this relationship Abie was provided with art materials and also produced a large body of works in the print medium. From the outset Abie Jangala’s paintings were unique recreations of the iconography that pertained to rain making ceremonies and the reverence in which Dreamings associated with the Rainbow Men are held amongst Warlpiri people. His early works were created on a deep thalo green or black ground with the stark symbols specifically representing rainbows, lightning, clouds, waterholes and frogs, composed in much the same way as they are etched in relief on the body of rainmakers when covered in kapok or feather down for ceremony. Abie typically painted these powerful symbols, which are also recreated in ceremonial ground constructions, in solid black or red, outlined in single alternate bands of bright yellow, green and red dots, thereby emboldening the icons to evoke the shimmering and alluring effect of the Rainbow Men and their dramatic manifestation as natural climatic phenomena. This allure is imitated by the glint from pieces of broken mirror or shiny belt buckles worn and carried by men in ceremony; and the glistening skin of women covered in animal fat and red ochre. Typically these paintings are in-filled with compact white dots representing rain or fields of hailstones. At the height of his artistic powers Abie could apply these uniform white dots in such a way as to evoke the same meditative quality as that of the raked grounds of Zen meditation gardens. Abie once explained that he painted, ‘the proper paintings… they are from my father. He comes to me in dreams and tells me what to paint, and how paint it’.

Stockroom

Click to enlarge

Abie & Tony Jangala & Samson

Region: Central Desert & Tanami
Community: Lajamanu
Language group: Warlpiri (Walpari, Walpiri, Walpirie)

Untitled

synthetic polymer paint on Belgian linen

91 x 71 cm

$1,600

Provenance: Warnayaka Art Centre, Lajamanu, NT
Exhibited: Desert Mob, Araluen Arts Centre, Alice Springs, NT, October 2005 Butcher Shop Cafe, Mudgee NSW, 2005
Artwork story: This work was painted by Abie Jangala when assisted in his old age by his grandson Tony Sampson. Born at Thompson’s Rockhole in the Tanami Desert, Abie Jangala was initiated in to Warlpiri Law and inherited his father’s responsibility for the essential Rainmaking and Water Dreamings of this vast and arid desert area. Abie began working at the Granites copper mines, where he first learnt English and became familiar with European ways. During the early 1990s Adrian Newstead entered into a representative relationship with Abie Jangala through his Coo-ee Aboriginal Art Gallery in Sydney. This relationship lasted until Abie’s death, including the short periods during which the art centre was resurrected. Through this relationship Abie was provided with art materials and also produced a large body of works in the print medium. From the outset Abie Jangala’s paintings were unique recreations of the iconography that pertained to rain making ceremonies and the reverence in which Dreamings associated with the Rainbow Men are held amongst Warlpiri people. His early works were created on a deep thalo green or black ground with the stark symbols specifically representing rainbows, lightning, clouds, waterholes and frogs, composed in much the same way as they are etched in relief on the body of rainmakers when covered in kapok or feather down for ceremony. Abie typically painted these powerful symbols, which are also recreated in ceremonial ground constructions, in solid black or red, outlined in single alternate bands of bright yellow, green and red dots, thereby emboldening the icons to evoke the shimmering and alluring effect of the Rainbow Men and their dramatic manifestation as natural climatic phenomena. This allure is imitated by the glint from pieces of broken mirror or shiny belt buckles worn and carried by men in ceremony; and the glistening skin of women covered in animal fat and red ochre. Typically these paintings are in-filled with compact white dots representing rain or fields of hailstones. At the height of his artistic powers Abie could apply these uniform white dots in such a way as to evoke the same meditative quality as that of the raked grounds of Zen meditation gardens. Abie once explained that he painted, ‘the proper paintings… they are from my father. He comes to me in dreams and tells me what to paint, and how paint it’.