Aboriginal Table Runner
 
Artist:  Damien Marks, DYM931
 
Size: 150cm x 45cm / 59” x 17.7”
 
100% Cotton
 
This is a teaching painting, describing a dry season in Damiens homeland, Mount Liebig, in the Northern Territory. It illustrates aspects of landscape and culture that was told to Damien by his great-grandparents. Women sit with children collecting bush potatoes (the red shapes at the top of the painting) and are preparing for inma (ceremony). One man, wati, sits down with his waru (spear). Controlled burnings are taking place as the spinifex is dry, and this means good fruits can grow. The small star-like symbols represent womens body paint that the women paint on each other for inma. A dry creekbed runs through the painting (in red and white), and there are cracks in the claypans, dried rockholes (tjukula), and sandhills (tali).
 
Royalties are paid to the artist and their family.