‘Mapa Wiya’ explores Aboriginal ‘Country’

HOUSTON — The Aboriginal peoples of Australia refer to their ancestral lands simply as “Country.” Aboriginal culture dates back 80,000 years, and there is rock art that dates back 20,000 years. In many ways, the art of the indigenous Australians has changed little in philosophy. The medium may have changed (sometimes), but the art still incorporates swirling lines and dots — lots of dots.

The Menil Collection’s latest exhibition, “Mapa Wiya (Your Map’s Not Needed): Australian Aboriginal Art from the Fondation Opale,” is a stellar collection of artists’ meditations their “Country,” both temporal and spiritual.

Before one enters “Mapa Wiya (Your Map’s Not Needed),” one is greeted by Fred Grant’s “Pulyuna,” a large painting that features a complex network of circles and interconnecting lines. One is struck by the complexity of the decorative patterns. This complex imagery is present throughout the exhibition, with many of the works featuring dots and lines that resemble maps of the earth and stars.

Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri’s “Love Story at Red Hill,” 1977, incorporates painted on footprints — approximations of feet with painted soles, as if someone walked across the canvas. This may be a nod to the Aboriginal “walkabout,” a rite of passage during which adolescent boys live in the outback for as long as six months to make a transition into manhood. It also references the rock art of the ancestors, who used hand and footprints in their work. However, where the ancient artists used their own body parts, Tjapaltjarri deals with illusion as the feet are clearly not real, but painted on.

“Tjutangku Kunpu Kanyini” by The Kanpi Women’s Collaborative — Maringka Baker, Kami Tunkin and Teresa Baker — features rich reds and oranges on a black background that seem to swirl in a suggested space. The pieces echo satellite photos of some mystical region of a far-off region of the solar system. At around 5-feet by 10-feet, the painting is large but the image seems to engulf the viewer on an epic scale.

Gulumbu Yunupingu’s “The Universe,” from 2006, uses natural earth and acrylics on eucalyptus bark. Although the piece is only around 24-inches by 30-inches, it also suggests an immense, one could say universal, scale. The eucalyptus bark looks like stiffened fabric. 

Yunupingu is also one of several artists represented in a series of hollow log coffins, all decorated with swirling dots and lines.

“Rainbow Dreaming-Love Magic at Papayuna,” by Rover Thomas Joolama, has the feel of a history piece. An object in the sky — sun or moon perhaps — hovers above eight layers of color that resemble not so much a rainbow as strata of the Earth, each layer rich with history.

Warlimpirrnga Tjapaltjarri’s acrylic on canvas, “Mamultjunkunya,” is a marvelous piece. At about 6-feet by 4-feet, it looks like a giant topographical map, with swirling lines designating mounds and hollows. It is even more impressive when one sees close up that the lines are actually long strands of connected dots. The attention to detail reveals an obsessive mindset that seems to be common to all the works in the show. 

The swirling dots and lines are in evidence again in Nata Nungurrayi’s “Rockhole Site of Marrapinti.” As one stares into the painting, one feels as though one is falling into the rockhole, weightless. 

The spiritual connection with the physical universe, as well as the spiritual, is evident in all the works. They are meditative pieces in the way that Mark Rothko’s paintings are, but with more ornamentation. But it is this complex patterning that is so calming. One gets lost in the movement inherent in the imagery.

The works in the show are all made after 1950 and deal with the struggle for Aboriginal civil rights in Australia. During the 19th and 20th centuries, white settlers moved Aboriginal peoples from their “Country” — their ancestral lands — and forced them into settlements as a form of segregation. Many of the exhibited artists were born during this period and experienced the struggle. They were not considered Australians and were denied citizenship of their own country.  Australian citizenship was finally won after a national referendum in 1967, and with it came voting rights and control of their “Country.”

“Mapa Wiya” means “No Map” in the Pitjantjatjara language of the Central Australian desert region, and the exhibition’s title draws on a work by Kunmanara (Mumu Mike) Williams, who paints on a collage surface of government maps and post bags that represent the artificial boundaries imposed on the Aboriginal “Country.”

The works on display in “Mapa Wiya” are inspiring and thought-provoking. No map is needed to engage with these beautiful and meaningful works.

The exhibition features more than 100 works by more than 60 artists and is on display through Feb. 2.

For more information, visit www.menil.org.

Story by Andy Coughlan, ISSUE editor