Hairstring Spindle (Love Spindle)

carved wood and hairstring

99 x 12 x 12 cm

$600

Provenance: Private Collection NT Cooee Aboriginal Art Gallery, NSW
Artwork story: Ceremonial item with sacred connotations. Clifford Possum often depicted this item in his famous Love Story paintings. "This is the tale of incestuous lust and the magical spells cast by an old Tjungurrayi man called Lintipilinti in order to seduce a woman of the wrong skin. To achieve this illicit end, Lintipilinti uses sacred songs and a hairstring spindle that he made from his own hair and a pair of thin sticks. The man is depicted in this work as a large U shape. The object of his desire is a wrong-skinned Napangardi woman who is travelling from Yuelamu (Mount Allen) looking for the native sugar that is found in abundance on Eucalyptus leaves, where it is deposited by small flying ants. The woman does not realise until too late that she is being stalked by the Tungurrayi who is telepathically calling her to him while using ritual paraphenalia and a sacred ground painting. Though she is a strictly forbidden sexual partner Lintipilinti shows no concern.

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carved wood and hairstring

99 x 12 x 12 cm

$600

Provenance: Private Collection NT Cooee Aboriginal Art Gallery, NSW
Artwork story: Ceremonial item with sacred connotations. Clifford Possum often depicted this item in his famous Love Story paintings. "This is the tale of incestuous lust and the magical spells cast by an old Tjungurrayi man called Lintipilinti in order to seduce a woman of the wrong skin. To achieve this illicit end, Lintipilinti uses sacred songs and a hairstring spindle that he made from his own hair and a pair of thin sticks. The man is depicted in this work as a large U shape. The object of his desire is a wrong-skinned Napangardi woman who is travelling from Yuelamu (Mount Allen) looking for the native sugar that is found in abundance on Eucalyptus leaves, where it is deposited by small flying ants. The woman does not realise until too late that she is being stalked by the Tungurrayi who is telepathically calling her to him while using ritual paraphenalia and a sacred ground painting. Though she is a strictly forbidden sexual partner Lintipilinti shows no concern.