Bush Fireby Marilyn Davies

This Aboriginal painting represent Bush Fire, which has been an essential survival tool for Aboriginal people, who lived in Central Australia's desert for tens of thousands of years. It has played, and continues to play a role in many aspects of life: warmth, hunting, cooking, tool making, communication, land management and bush medicine.

There is a very special bond between the men and fire. Knowledge of fire is passed on through ancient ancestral stories. It is the man's job to start the fire & the woman's job to keep it burning. Fire was, and in some placed still is, used to 'clean up' the country for walking, hunting, signalling, ceremonies and to encourage plant and animal foods. The men strategically burnt patches giving the landscape a mosaic pattern of different aged grasses.

Traditionally desert Aboriginal men would use a sawing motion to make fire. The base was made by cutting a wedge shape out of a soft wooden shield, tinder was then placed in the wedge (soft grass or kangaroo droppings). The edge of an amirre (spear thrower) or alye (boomerang) were then passed in a sawing motion across the cavity until the tinder was smouldering.

Artist:Marilyn Davies
Title:Bush Fire
ID:0701543
Medium:Acrylic on Belgian Linen
Size:188 x 128 cm
Region:Alice Springs, Central Australia

Artist

Marilyn Davies is a southern Arrente woman; she comes from an area south of Alice Springs in Central Australia. Marilyn speaks both Arrente and Arrabunna as well as English however she has a wide linguistic understanding of many local Aboriginal languages found in Central Australia.

Marilyn is a hobbist artist and uses her unique understanding of traditional women’s stories combined with her understanding of wider social issues which affect not only Indigenous Australian’s but the wider population in relation to global health concerns. She brings attention to issues such as drugs, alcohol, petrol sniffing and other substance abuse issues through her artworks.

Using aspects of traditional women’s Dreamings her artworks are fastidious, precise, colourful and resonant. The artwork that Central Art has available is titled “Bush Fire” and represents the essential survival tool that fire has played in the survival of Aboriginal people who have lived in the Central Australian desert for tens of thousands of years. The use of fire has played and continues to play a key role in many aspects of life and survival such as for warmth, hunting, cooking, tool making, communication, land management and bush medicine.

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