Deutscher and Hackett

The paintings of Djerrkŋu Yunupiŋu stem from her memory of a time before she was born when her spirit appeared before her father in the form of a mermaid, signalling her conception. The day after this magical encounter, Djerrkŋu’s mother discovered she was pregnant. Born in 1945 at the end of the second world war, Yunupiŋu was a senior Yolŋu elder and artist based in Yirrkala in the Northern Territory. A member of the creative Yunupiŋu family, she was the daughter of Mungurrawuy, and the sister of Nyapanyapa, Gulumbu, Barrupu, and Galarrwuy Yunupiŋu.
 
Executed on bark and timber board, using a unique combination of natural earth pigments and reclaimed toner ink (ground polyester) from discarded printer cartridges, Yunupiŋu’s remarkable ‘mermaid paintings’ record intimate episodes of the artist’s life. Here, Yemaya, 2020 recalls the passing of her granddaughter’s child when, at a later gathering, ‘the whole community poured their love into a massive ceremony which celebrated her spirit... In Yolŋu way as I am the maternal great grandmother, she is just like me, and I am a mermaid. I painted this for her whilst the ceremony was going on. Here she is with her beautiful parents.’1
 
The accompanying certificate of authenticity from Buku-Larrŋgay Mulka Centre records Djerrkŋu Yunupiŋu’s story and states in part:
 
‘Around that time, I was conceived in my mother’s belly and my spirit was the Mermaid, white skinned from the ocean with scales. And that is when my spirit revealed itself to my Father.
My dad was walking in the morning with his spear and his woomera (spear thrower). He walked down to the beach to hope he could spear a fish. Where he is walking on the beach there are these rocks and on the rock was sitting this mermaid.
 
My dad sees the tail of the mermaid and thinks he has seen a fish, so he walks closer and closer and closer and silently puts the woomera into the spear ready to throw. He throws the spear at the mermaid, but she jumps into the water. The spear hits her tail though and the blood from it sits on the water. My father speared my spirit being, it shows here on my leg… this black marking. Speared me thinking I was a big fish; the fish dived deeper in a cave underneath the sea… and there was lots and lots of blood. My father felt sorry for that fish seeing lots of blood. He cupped a handful and smelt it and realised that it was human blood.
 
So he stands very still and thinks, then he turns around and heads home. He gets home and lies down and falls into a deep sleep. He is very worried about the human blood. He dreams. In his dream he sees the mermaid and realises it was no ordinary fish. It was me. I was telling him in the dream ‘That was me dad, don’t spear me. Bapa… why did you try to spear me? It is I, it was not a fish.’
 
He woke up and saw my mother preparing yams, ganguri. She was cooking ganguri and he said to himself, ‘OK I will ask your mother whether she is having a baby or not.’ My father said to her, ‘I just had a dream… are you with child?’ ‘Yes, I am with child,’ my mother said. And so, it was this time when they all boarded the canoes, two canoes, with all my mothers, and headed to Yirrkala.’