Medicine Clay - Gidjarr | Simone Arnol & Bernard Singleton

Medicine Clay - Gidjarr | Simone Arnol & bernard Singleton

7 - 25 February, 2023

One way to preserve our cultural knowledge is to share it. 

To ensure the transmission of knowledge from one generation of family to the next, we must embed the knowledge systems practiced by our old people’s into our own cultural and spiritual routines. To feel the earth beneath our feet and to feel it through our hands allows us to ground ourselves, which was a subconscious practice of our old people. 

Through a new series of photographic works, our exhibition ‘Medicine Clay – Gidjarr’ continues the use of the medicinal clay with the red ochre to adorn four generations of family and to document the continued connection with our people, place, and practices. 

— Simone Arnol & Bernard Singleton, 2023

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Medicine Clay | Simone Arnol & Bernard Singleton

Medicine Clay | Simone Arnol & Bernard Singleton

9 February - 6 March, 2022

For their first exhibition at Jan Manton Gallery, Simone Arnol (Gunggandji) and Bernard Singleton Jnr (Umpila/Djabugay/Yirrgay) present Medicine Clay (2019-20). This collaborative photographic series presents intimate portraits of three generations of Bernard Singleton Jnr’s family—his father, his niece and himself—each coated in a layer of coarse white clay. Known as medicine clay, this revered material is often used by members of Bernard’s family for the treatment of sore bellies, women’s business, and general wellbeing.

Over this medicine clay, a rich, red ochre has been painted onto each figure in heavy, oily streaks. This ochre is used by Simone and Bernard to represent ancestral connections to Country, and the transfer of knowledge between generations. Its placement is significant to each bearer. Bernard’s father wears a thick layer of ochre over his left hand in reference to matrilineal lines of knowledge, passed onto family members through his wife and their marriage. Stripes of ochre stretch across Bernard’s and his niece’s foreheads, signifying their own responsibilities to learn and pass on this knowledge.

In these photographs, Simone and Bernard seek to create a record of knowledge, rituals and customs to be passed on to coming generations. Quiet and meditative, they convey a sense of intense presence and magnanimity.

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