Women of ParuPart 3 of a series of portraits of Ardent Indigenous Australian Women by photographer Heide Smith. Marjorie Wonnamirri  Paru Melville Island 1987 – portrait by Heide Smith Paru is a small place on the west coast of Bathurst Island, just over the Apsley straight from Nguiu – now called Wurrumiyanga –  on Melville Island. It […]

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Hunting with Tiwi WomenPart 2 of a series of portraits of Ardent Indigenous Australian Women by photographer Heide Smith. Hunting for Possum with Valma – portrait by Heide Smith Hunting with  Tiwi Women. The air is smoky. The Tiwi have been burning off, so it’s a good time to go hunting with the Tiwi. Some women asked […]

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Ardent Indigenous Australian Women A series of portraits of strong Tiwi Women by photographer Heide Smith.  Off to Tarantippi Beach 1987 I recently made a promise on Facebook to show some of the portraits from my collection of Strong Tiwi Women. It’s called “Ardent Indigenous Australian Women”, and this is the first post.It was ‘Dry Season’  […]

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The story behind the image – four little TiwiThis is the second post in the series “the story behind the image”. All the images in the series are featured in the Josef Lebovic Gallery Catalogue of Heide’s work, which you can see on my website.From the catalogue16.| |Four Little Tiwis, Bathurst Island,| 1988/1990.| Vintage silver […]

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 The story behind the image – Gerardine  In our last blog we featured the Josef Lebovic Gallery Catalogue of Heide’s work. We talked about the work involved in preparing images for the catalogue of such a prestigious gallery, and we promised a future series of posts talking about “the story behind the image”. So here’s the […]

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My tiwi sister Gerardine TungatalumI want to honour the memory of my Tiwi sister Gerardine Tungatalum, on this International Women’s Day. Gerardine, a proud traditional Tiwi Elder, was loved and respected by all who knew her, and was my friend and mentor on my early visits to the Tiwi Islands. There are more portraits of […]

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Indigenous Australians – Tiwi Museum continuing the story of my latest trip to the Tiwi Isles from 11-18 April. At the Museum I meet Fiona and Magdalene Kerinaiua and the younger Joanita Tipiloura again. Fiona is busy on the computer and Maggie is translating old Tiwi stories to English. Magdalene actually featured in my 1990 […]

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Indigenous Australians Tiwi – coming home It’s April 11 at last, and I am off to Bathurst Island north of Darwin. Love these small planes. You can see so much. Can’t wait to be back to my other home, the Tiwi Isles. Though only for a week, I hope to see old friends again. My […]

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