Banduk Marika

Banduk Mamburra Wananamba Marika (13 October 1954 – 12 July 2021), known after her death as Dr B Marika, was an artist, printmaker and environmental activist from Arnhem Land, Northern Territory, Australia, who was dedicated to the development, recognition and preservation of Indigenous Australian art and culture. She used her artwork to translate her ancestral stories through figures and motifs. She was the first Aboriginal person to serve on the National Gallery of Australia's board.

Early life Marika was born on 13 October 1954 at Yirrkala, north-east Arnhem Land, a member of the Rirratjingu clan of the Yolngu people, whose traditional land is Yalangbara. Yalangbara is located south of Yirrkala in north-east Arnhem Land, and is considered by the Yolngu to be the original place of human creation. was an artist and he taught her the techniques of bark painting. He was also a ceremonial leader of the Rirratjingu clan. and teacher-linguist/artist Yalmay Marika Yunupingu (who served at Yirrkala School for 40 years teaching "both ways" bilingual education until her retirement in 2023); also, Bayngul and Laklak.

Marika was educated at the mission at Yirrkala until the age of 15.

Marika's family participated in the Yirrkala Bark Petition, a significant piece of activist art that led to the Australian government to grant ownership rights of aboriginal land to Yolngu people, which had originally been given to Nabalco for mining.

Marika was among a small group to be taught and supported by male relatives (including her father

Artist Ruby Alderton is her daughter.

Artistic career

She moved first to Darwin in 1972

In 2017 she and Tiwi Islander Bede Tungutalum were chosen to design a set of four postage stamps with the theme "Art of the North" for Australia Post.

Exhibitions and collections Her work has been shown in America, India, Egypt, Noumea and Singapore, and is represented in the collections of the National Gallery of Australia; and the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C. This was the first print by a Yirrkala artist that the University's art collection acquired. In 2016, Trinity College, Melbourne acquired her Yalaŋbara suite of works on paper, and the Burke Gallery at the college mounted an exhibition of her work in early 2021.

Other work and roles

Film

She worked as a translator with Film Australia and on the TV series Women of the Sun. Cactus (1986), directed by Paul Cox and starring Isabelle Huppert; and Copyrites (1997), a documentary film about Aboriginal copyright (see also below).

She also appeared in Bride for all Seasons! (?) and the docudrama television series Flight into Hell (1985). She features in the ABC Television documentary film, Dream Time, Machine Time (1987 )

Indigenous intellectual property

Banduk said in 1997:

1993–4 Copyright case

In 1993, it was found that Marika's print Djanda and the Sacred Waterhole (1988) had been reproduced without permission on rugs made in Vietnam and marketed by the Perth-based company Indofurn Pty Ltd. A total of eight artists took action against the company, and in 1994 However no damages were ever paid to the artists or their next-of-kin, because the company was declared bankrupt and wound up.

A documentary film called Copyrites (1997),

Land and language

In 1999 Marika started working towards attaining heritage listing status and was head of the Mawalan Gamarrwa Nuwul Association, a local landcare organisation.

She was a board member of the Indigenous Art Code, a group of artists, curators, and arts and legal organisations working to outlaw fake Indigenous art.

Later life and death

In 2020, she said in a television interview:

After her death, per Yolngu tradition, she is no longer referred to by her full name, but called Dr B Marika.

Honours and recognition

A colour photographic portrait of Marika taken by Anne Zahalka in 1990 is held by the National Portrait Gallery of Australia.

At the 2001 National Indigenous Arts Awards Marika won the Red Ochre Award for her work in the visual arts, the award having been created to recognise "outstanding contribution to the development and recognition of Indigenous arts and culture.

Her book, Yalangbara: Art of the Djang'kawu, was joint winner of the 2009 Chief Minister's Northern Territory Book History Awards.

In April 2018 Marika received an honorary doctorate from Flinders University for "her remarkable contributions as a First Nations artist and cultural advocate for the Yolngu people".

Also in 2020, she was honoured as Senior Territorian of the Year.

Works

The book Gong-wapitja : Women and art from Yirrkala, northeast Arnhem Land (1998) includes "Story from Banduk".