Murdoch University Art Collection is delighted to announce the recent acquisition a powerful bark painting titled Yirrinkiripwoja by senior respected Tiwi Islands artist Kaye Brown.

Painted with ochres gathered from her Country of Mananowmi/Andranangoo (Goose Creek) on Melville Island, this painting embodies the deep continuity between land, ceremony, and contemporary practice. Brown’s distinctive technique which layers clusters of fine dots across bold blocks of red, yellow, black and white evokes the rhythms of ceremonial body designs used in yirrinkiripwoja (body painting) and yoi (dance). The painting recalls her Tartuwali (shark) dance, anchoring the artwork in lived cultural experience while projecting a strikingly contemporary visual language.

The bark itself, cut and prepared by her brother Kenny Brown, reinforces the artist and artwork’s direct connection to place and family. The application of pigment with a pwoja or kayimwagakimi (carved ironwood comb) continues traditions passed down through generations.

Brown was born circa 1950 in Milikapiti, is a respected elder and leading figure of Tiwi Islands art practice who has dedicated herself to painting fulltime at Jilamara Arts & Craft Association on Melville Island after early careers in nursing and teaching. Her jilamara (designs) articulate her matrilineal yiminga (skin group), Takaringuwi (Scaly Mullet), preserving the ceremonial patterns and ancestral knowledge of the wulimawi (old people).

Brown has been as a finalist in the Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Awards in 2018, 2023 and 2025. Her artworks have been included in important exhibitions such as TIWI at National Gallery of Australia in 2020, Bark Salon at National Gallery of Victoria in 2024 and Inner Sanctum: Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art at The Art Gallery of South Australia in 2024. Most recently, Yirrinkiripwoja was exhibited in Parlingarri Amintiya Ningani Awungarra: Old and New at UNSW Galleries in 2025.

Tiwi art is one of the most significant features of the Murdoch  University’s Indigenous Art Collection. In 1998, Multiplex founder, the late John Roberts AO donated over 100 Indigenous artworks and artifacts to Murdoch University Art Collection. This donation remains one of the University’s most significant artwork gifts by a single donor. The most important element of this donation is a group of 10 carved and hand painted Tiwi Pukumani Poles ceremonial totems.

To pay respect to the significance of the Roberts donation and to further develop the Tiwi art feature, the Art Collection has grown its holding of Tiwi artworks in a range of mediums by emerging, mid-career and senior artists. The acquisition of Yirrinkiripwoja reinforces this commitment whilst honouring the artistry and cultural knowledge of First Nations communities and amplifying the voices of senior artists who sustain and reimagine these traditions for future generations.

Artwork credit:

Kaye Brown – Yirrinkiripwoja, 2024, ochre pigments & synthetic binder on stringybark, 170cm x 88cm. Purchased 2025.