Mungurrawuy Yunupingu facts for kids

Mungurrawuy Yunupingu (born around 1905, died 1979) was a very important Aboriginal Australian artist and leader. He belonged to the Gumatj clan of the Yolngu people. They live in northeastern Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory of Australia. He was especially famous for his bark paintings.

About Mungurrawuy Yunupingu

Mungurrawuy Yunupingu was born in Arnhem Land around 1905. He was part of the Yirritja group, which is one of two main family groups in Yolngu culture.

He became a respected leader of the Gumatj clan in Yirrkala. This made him one of the most important painters of his time. He was the top Gumatj artist during the mission days in Arnhem Land.

Mungurrawuy Yunupingu passed away in Arnhem Land in 1979.

His Talented Family

Many of Mungurrawuy's children grew up to be famous artists, musicians, and leaders. His daughters Gulumbu Yunupingu, Gaymala Yunupingu, and Nyapanyapa Yunupingu became well-known artists.

His sons Galarrwuy and Mandawuy Yunupingu both received the "Australian of the Year" award. This shows how important their family was to Australian culture.

Mungurrawuy's Art Career

The Sea and the Sky (1948)

As an artist, Mungurrawuy Yunupingu used old stories from his ancestors in his paintings. He also made wood carvings. He was one of the first artists to paint stories in a "series" or "episodic" way. This meant he would paint different parts of a story in several panels to show how it happened over time.

This was a new idea, as most artists at the time painted a whole story in just one panel. His paintings often used a lot of yellow, and his human figures had wide shoulders and long bodies.

Important Art Projects

Mungurrawuy was part of many big moments in Yolngu art history. In 1946, he made many crayon drawings for a researcher named Ronald Berndt. In 1948, he created a large number of paintings for the 1948 American-Australian Scientific Expedition to Arnhem Land.

Between 1959 and 1962, he made some of his biggest and most important works. These were large bark paintings that told the main ancestral stories of the Yolngu clans. These works are now mostly kept at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. Some are also in other museums, like the Saint Louis Art Museum.

Paintings of Makassan Visitors

Besides ancestral stories, Mungurrawuy also painted about the Makassan people. These were seafarers who came to northern Arnhem Land each year. They came to collect trepang, which are sea cucumbers.

It is thought that Mungurrawuy was very young when he last met Makassan people. This was because the Australian Government stopped other countries from using Australian coastal resources in 1906. But he remembered meeting them. He even drew his famous Port of Macassar for Ronald Berndt.

Modern Themes in Art

In the late 1960s, Mungurrawuy was asked to create paintings about the ELDO tracking station at Gurlkurla. This station helped track rockets. One of his paintings, Space Tracking Station (1967), is now in the South Australian Museum.

Another painting, Man Landing on the Moon (1969), shows Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin's Moon landing. This artwork is kept at the Kluge-Ruhe Aboriginal Art Collection at the University of Virginia.

The Yirrkala Church Panels (1963)

In 1963, the Australian Prime Minister announced that bauxite mines would open in Arnhem Land. He did this without asking the Yolngu leaders. The Yolngu people were very upset because they were not consulted.

How the Panels Were Made

Because of this, the clan elders decided to create the famous Yirrkala Church Panels. These panels showed the Yolngu people's claim to their land through their ancestral stories.

There were two large sheets, each about 4 meters long. Eight elders from the Dhuwa group painted one sheet with their main ancestral stories. Eight elders from the Yirritja group, including Mungurrawuy, painted the other sheet with their designs. This was the first time Aboriginal Australians used physical art to make a strong political claim to their land.

Impact of the Panels

These panels led to the creation of the Yirrkala Bark Petitions in 1963. Mungurrawuy Yunupingu was one of the people who signed these petitions. The petitions were an important step in the fight for Aboriginal land rights in Australia. They also led to a famous court case called Milirrpum v Nabalco Pty Ltd.

The church threw away the Yirrkala panels in 1974. But they were saved by the Buku-Larrnggay Mulka Centre in 1978. In 1998, the panels were shown again by the Prime Minister at the time, John Howard. Yolngu leaders called them "Title Deeds" for their traditional lands.

Copies of the panels were made for the movie Yolngu Boy (2000). These copies were created in 1999 by Yolngu artists Nancy Gaymala Yunupingu, Gulumbu, and Dhuwarrwarr Marika.

Art Collections

Mungurrawuy Yunupingu's artworks can be found in many important collections, including:

• Art Gallery of New South Wales
• Art Gallery of South Australia
• Kluge-Ruhe Aboriginal Art Collection of the University of Virginia
• National Museum of Australia
• Saint Louis Art Museum
• Berndt Museum of the University of Western Australia

Major Art Exhibitions

Mungurrawuy Yunupingu's art has been shown in many significant exhibitions:

• 1965: Australian Aboriginal Bark Paintings 1912-1964, Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, England
• 1988: Dreamings: The Art of Aboriginal Australia, Asia Society Galleries, New York City
• 1993-94: Aratjara: Art of the First Australians, Europe, in Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Dusseldorf, Germany; Hayward Gallery, London, England; and the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebæk, Denmark
• 2013-14: Yirrkala Drawings, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney; Berndt Museum of Anthropology, University of Western Australia, Perth; Charles Darwin University Art Gallery, Charles Darwin University, Darwin
• 2013-2020: Old Masters: Australia's Great Bark Artists, National Museum of Australia, Canberra; National Taiwan Museum, Taipei City; Sichuan Museum, Chengdu; Shenzhen Museum, Shenzhen; Shanghai Natural History Museum, Shanghai; National Museum of China, Beijing