Girringun artists' work goes global as iconic fire-starter sparks ancient skills revival - ABC News

Topic:Visual Art

For countless generations, a unique, body-shaped tool with holes for eyes has been keeping Indigenous communities warm on chilly nights in the rainforests of northern Queensland.

Now the ancient fire-starter — known as Bagu — is generating heat of a different kind after being introduced to the international art world, and featuring prominently as an installation on the foreshore at Cardwell, north of Townsville.

With the ocean backdrop, the giant sculptures have become popular with tourists posing beside them.

Tourists love to pose beside these giant Bagu sculptures on the Cardwell foreshore. (Supplied: Tourism Tropical North Queensland)

"People come up and say, 'Oh look at these little dolls'," Girramay artist Nephi Denham says.

"You kind of have a laugh and you go, 'No'."

The Bagu represents the unique craft of nine traditional owner groups from the Hinchinbrook region.

Artist Nephi Denham has taken the Bagu to nearly every capital city in Australia. (ABC News: Baz Ruddick)

Traditionally, the tools were made from boogadilla — a soft milky pine wood — perfect for starting fires.

Today, the figures that appear in galleries across the country and overseas are mostly made from elaborately decorated clay.

To start a fire, the original wooden Bagu was drilled with a Jiman, a long, cylindrical piece of wood from mudja, hardwood from a guava tree.

The Bagu was originally made from milky pine wood and used to start fires. (ABC News: Baz Ruddick)

The friction of the Jiman would create a coal that could be then used to make a full fire.

The tool and other traditional artefacts are now made at the Girringun Art Centre, which represents about 30 Indigenous artists.

Bagu are now usually made from clay, which is then decorated to tell a story. (ABC News: Baz Ruddick)

Girringun manager Whitney Casey, a Mandubarra woman, said the centre began as a way to get Indigenous people "back on the traditional tools".

"It only just started with a small number of weavers," she said.

The gallery has now commercialised and expanded its Bagu production as its reputation has soared around the country and overseas.

Whitney Casey says elders have rediscovered lost skills at the centre. (ABC News: Baz Ruddick)

"When they [people] see Girringun they automatically think of the fire tool. It's the ceramic," she said.

"Everyone is buying a piece of this artwork."

The making and use of Bagu was originally reserved for men but, after a meeting among elders several years ago, it was decided to allow women to also create the artefact and for it to be made in a more contemporary form.

In more recent times, women have been allowed to make Bagu sculptures. (ABC News: Baz Ruddick)

"They've kind of still maintained that same structure of the traditional tool and they still have the tribal motifs that connect them to culture," he said.

"But over the years I've seen flowers painted on them, Spiderman painting on them — just personalities in the way they choose their colour to create them, bringing them out from the traditional colour into a more creative vibe."

The Bagu has become the symbol for the Girringun Art Centre and is now well known in art circles around the world. (ABC News: Baz Ruddick)

Mr Denham, who has held Bagu workshops in most Australian states, said the unique object had also been included in Aboriginal art showcases overseas.

In 2016, 10 giant Bagu were installed outside Monaco's Oceanographic Museum as part of an exhibition about marine conservation, which highlighted Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artworks.

The Bagu installation at Monaco's Oceanographic Museum in 2016 put the Girringun art on the world stage. (Supplied: Michel Dagnino-Laetitia Loas/Oceanographic Museum, Monaco)

Mr Denham said when most people thought about Indigenous art they pictured dot paintings from the Northern Territory.

But the distinctive shape and individual personalities of the modern Bagu sculptures had attracted buyers, both locally and internationally, who were interested in different styles of Aboriginal art.

"Some people come to our art centre and ask for dot paintings and we go, 'No, we don't do them — we respect them, but that is their painting'," he said.

Beyond the Bagu, the Girringun Art Centre has become a place where community elders have started to revive forgotten skills.

Abe Muriata learned how to weave traditional baskets by deconstructing some to work out how they were made. (ABC News: Baz Ruddick)

Girramay man Abe Muriata said his own journey with traditional arts started when he realised skills had been lost in his community.

"We had dignitaries coming to our community … I've asked some of our old people to make some sort of basket for them. They threw some together and it was not the best," he said.

"I was really disappointed in what we gave those dignitaries because I knew that we can make really good baskets.

"The traditional basket that comes from here is such an exquisite artefact."

Abe Muriata has taught himself traditional basket weaving skills so they won't be lost. (ABC News: Baz Ruddick)

Mr Muriata said he made it his mission to revive the lost craft of making Jawan, a traditional basket, and Wungarr, a traditional eel trap.

"I don't think our old people saw it as art. It was an everyday thing," he said.

Mr Muriata remembers gathering lawyer cane for his grandparents and other elders to use to make baskets in the 1960s, when he was a boy.

Now artists use a variety of contemporary materials — such as plastic — to weave.

The Jawan basket is painstakingly made by weaving strands cut from lawyer cane. (ABC News: Baz Ruddick)

"I had a basic idea but when I started weaving it I knew there was a lot of technique and knowledge missing to achieve the real artefact stuff — the artisan stuff," he said.

Seeing traditionally woven baskets on display at the Queensland Museum/Kurilpa inspired Mr Muriata to try to perfect the technique, by visually deconstructing the form.

He is determined to teach others how to create the beautiful, sturdy baskets his people once made, so the skills are not lost forever.

Weaver Erica Muriata uses contemporary materials with traditional techniques to create baskets. (ABC News: Baz Ruddick)

Baskets had many uses in the past, including being used for processing food, for ceremonial purposes, for carrying babies and for holding sacred objects.

"I hope to bring it back to its former glory where you can go to a museum and you wouldn't know that difference if it was made yesterday," he said.

"There's such a long process in making a basket."

Mr Muriata's weaving has taken him around the world.

In 2015, he met King Charles, who was then the Prince of Wales, when the British Museum commissioned him to make a basked for an exhibition in London.

Abe Muriata with the basket commissioned for the British Museum. (Supplied )

"To get to this final point it took years. Some of my old ones are rubbish compared to what I should be doing," he said.

"Once you know the technique and the ancient knowledge behind it, you can only expect something of the best quality.

"I was told it is the only trade Aboriginals ever had that they learned as a kid."

Emily Murray can't recall a time when she wasn't drawn to creating art. (ABC News: Baz Ruddick)

Ms Casey said the centre aimed to connect elders with the younger generation so traditional skills could be passed down.

"We don't just provide a safe space, we provide some professional development for the artists," she said.

"We try and help them on their pathway to create what they love doing.

Girramay and Jirbal artist Emily Murray grew up painting but started working with clay later in life. (ABC News: Baz Ruddick)

"With these artworks, the artists are able to tell stories about how they grew up, about their traditions, and pass it on to the younger generation."

Elder Philip Denham said he only started making art at the age of 60 following heart surgery because he was no longer able to do strenuous work outside.

Girramay man Phillip Denham began making and painting the Bagu figures when he was in his early 60s. (ABC News: Baz Ruddick)

"So I started something that was more natural and calm and where I can have my space and time to myself," he said.

"Back then — young, wild and free — it was all 'work hard and party hard'. But then I had the bypass and I thought I'd better slow up."

Phillip Denham says he is still learning about his cultural connection to art. (ABC News: Baz Ruddick)

Mr Denham Snr said he was still learning how to improve his art and hoped that it would lead him to a deeper understanding of his culture.

"They often say that there is a little man inside [the Bagu] that creates the fire and if you muck around with him, a fire will show you its power," he said.

Tourists love to pose beside these giant Bagu sculptures on the Cardwell foreshore. (ABC News: Baz Ruddick)

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Girringun artists' work goes global as iconic fire-starter sparks ancient skills revival - ABC News