Biography

Originally from Northern Australia, Clara Wubuqwubuk belongs to an Arnhem Land community made famous by her paintings on bark celebrating the Great Ancestors at the origin of the region's clans: spirits, human creatures, but also animals and, as in this case, plants, these Great Ancestors who emerged from the original magma are reputed to have shaped the continent in their image, populated it with beings in their image and given the Aboriginal clans laws, customs and rites.

In her works, the artist pays homage to the munyigani, the Aboriginal name for the yam and her personal totem. With its highly nutritious tubers, the yam is the traditional staple food of Aboriginal communities. As such, it has become a symbol of fertility that should be embraced in all its glory. This is what Clara Wubuqwubuk does, drawing numerous tubers whose vertical dimension evokes the energy of a push.

As a woman, the artist is also particularly involved in the rituals celebrating the plant, and painting is therefore a religious act. Indeed, the background against which the yam roots stretch is a reminder of this sacred dimension: it is made up of religious motifs painted (like the tubers) with natural ochres - natural pigments traditionally used in religious painting. These motifs themselves have a clan and initiatory value, since they function as a symbol of the clan.