Paalampaltharu
“This sculpture is made for a woman that I never met, though know strange and intimate details about, and, amongst others, owe my existence to.”
“I know that of eleven possible eye colours, hers was ‘number 8 – light brown’, and that the external, median and internal eye folds were all similarly categorised, along with Eye Obliquity, whatever that is. They did not measure what her eyes looked like when she smiled.
There are enough recorded measurements of her bone structure to attempt a reasonable reconstruction, though I don’t know how she stood, walked or sat.”
“These details were recorded at the Brewarrina Mission in July 1938 by the anthropologist and genealogist, Norman Tindale, though she was not from Brewarrina.”
“Mrs Kelly (Minnie), was born at Kallara Station and was identified as a member of the ‘Gu:Nu’ (Kurnu) tribe. The record shows that she spoke English in company, and her native tongue while at home, and a hand-written notation indicates what it was that she said;”
“My country starts at Tilpa and Louth down from Bourke on Darling River. I am a Barkindji, a person of the Barka or River”
“This sculpture represents my Great, Great Grandmother, Minnie Kelly, and the Kurnu-Barkindji. This white flower, known as the Darling River Lily, is endemic to the floodplains of the Darling, and belongs to, and survives in that soil, as does her story. The two blossoms represent the Warrego and Darling converging within the traditional lands of the Kurnu-Barkindji.”
Minnie Kelly via Andrew Hull
Kurnu Barkindji
Corten steel and polished stainless steel
Designed by Andrew Hull
Fabricated by Wangstone Studio