Tiwi Culture and Ceremonies

Tiwi people have lived on Bathurst and Melville Island for thousands of years and maintain a unique language and culture deeply embedded with a connection to land, skin group, dance, song and artistic styles, all developed in isolation from the mainland.  


Much of Tiwi art makes reference to the Palaneri (Tiwi Creation Period) and the Pukumani (funeral) and Kulama (initiation) ceremonies that followed.


The carving and painting of ironwood poles and figures is a Tiwi art and cultural tradition. Elaborately carved and painted in ochre, the Pukumani poles, or Tutini, are a major feature of the Tiwi Pukumani ceremony. The poles are installed around the grave site at the close of ceremony to signify the end of the mourning period.

With the painted ceiling panels above their heads, and the sounds and sights of the bush around, Ngaruwanajirri artists draw inspiration for their subject matter in pattern, line, and form. Their art may have a base in traditional patterns derived from family, nature, and wildlife or from the objects in the vicinity. Older cultural practices and memories are, however, within all Tiwi, especially those customs related to ceremonies and family.

Kulama

Like most other peoples of the world, Tiwi mark the stages of life. Births are texted to all relatives with elation; success in life is shared also, in pride and honour it brings to the family as well as the imminent distribution of any gains – whether those be a salary, a prize, a new car or a win at the card games. In the not so distant past the major life achievement ceremony was bravery, shown in the Kulama.

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    A process of temporal and spiritual trials and learning for the initiates mainly concerned with memory and recitation of customs and practices including the preparation and sharing of a particular dangerous yam. As failure caused retribution, this ceremony has waned today but its visual symbols of the Kulama circle (in which the initiates sat) and the pathway lines for the 3 day events form the basis of many artworks on the Tiwi Islands.


    The Ceiling panels include a number with references to the Kulama inspiring related artists. Alexandrina Kantilla often chooses to express a circular pattern structure like the overhead panel by her niece the late Marie Josette Orsto who in turn was taught the Kulama references in art by her father Declan Apuatimi, a very famous senior artist who led the Kulama from the 1970s.


Pukumani

The funeral ceremony is most important to Tiwi – enabling family to express grief and to allow the spirit of the deceased to find comfort and rest. The old grave sites throughout the bush exhibit long abandoned Pukumani pole installations like sculptures leaning to each other or resting, the old painted designs on their surfaces all but gone.

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    All the Ngaruwanajirri artists grew up attending these funerals of dance and memorial songs and saw the painting of faces and bodies, the erection of burial poles, and the use and distribution of objects used in funerals- Tunga (bark carriers for the possessions of the deceased) clubs of many designs, carved and painted, and many pamajini (ceremonial armbands).


    Pukumani poles, called Tutini are still produced, usually for a major commission either for a public event or venue, or a major Gallery exhibition. Good straight Ironwood (Erythrophleum chlorostachys) used to create Tutini is increasingly hard to find locally and very heavy to transport.


    Certain birds are associated with ceremonial practices, particularly the Curlew, the Owl and the Cockatoos from which the feathers are used for headdresses in the Pukumani ceremony.

Our Big Tiwi Story

Purukupali

The characters of this story go back to ancient creation times. Purukupali was the great hunter and warrior, Bima, his wife came to also be known as Wai-Ai, curlew, and they had a son, Jinani. Purukupali’s brother Tapara is the other main figure in the story; he is the moon.


The carved figures from Ngaruwanajirri often represent one or more of these characters. Their story that follows tells how death came into the world.

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    “Purukupali was off hunting and Bima was approached by Tapara to come into the bush with him as he wanted her. She placed her baby down and agreed, but during the time they spent together the hot rays of the sun shifted and her baby died. Returning to find her baby dead, Bima was inconsolable and kept wailing, shrieking Wai -ai. When Purukupali returned and saw this he was immensely angry, but, although Tapara offered to bring the baby back to life Purukupali refused, fighting him with ironwood club then declaring that now all people must die. A funeral called the Pukumani was ordained with all the people mourning. Tapara, the moon, retreated to the sky where he stayed. He waxes and wanes, each day sinking then rising again as he had promised to do for Jinani, the baby. Purukupali is known everywhere as a hard man, but one who believed in Tiwi laws and customs and ordained these for humans today. At night the eerie mourning call of Wai-ai, the curlew, can always be heard.”


    This story tells of all the birds attending the funeral calling in their own sounds and language, and the roles of various other characters in the making of regalia (feather ornaments) and bark carrying bags (tunga). 


    The Pukumani Poles that are distributed through the bush around Tiwi grave sites are a sign of this early origin of the custom of the Tiwi Islands. Some say the burial poles represent family, keeping the spirit of the deceased company, others say these simply signal a loved person of status is buried there.