Sculpture
- Gallery: Room 24
- Maker: Gawirrin 1 Gumana
- Made in: Yirrkala
- Date: 2002 (circa)
- Object type: sculpture, memorial pole, coffin
- Materials: wood
- Museum number: Oc2003,01.2
- Museum: The British Museum
- Collection record: British Museum website
- Image © The Trustees of the British Museum, shared under a CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 licence.
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About this object
This sculpture, titled "Barama/Captain Cook," was created in 2002 in Yirrkala by Gawirrin 1 Gumana. It is a decorative memorial pole and hollow log coffin, or larrakitj, made from carved wood and painted with ochre pigments. The artwork shows the Dhalwangu ancestor Barama, who brought sacred hardwood objects called rangga. At the top of the pole are two carved faces in yellow-brown ochre. Along the side, you can see a relief-carved staff and patterns representing a fish trap and the heron Gany’tjurr. These symbols connect to freshwater and sacred waterholes, representing a place where life begins. The artist connected Captain Cook to Barama, suggesting both figures tried to bring law to the land, but with very different results.
See it in person
Sculpture is on display in Room 24 at the British Museum on Great Russell Street, Bloomsbury, London — free to enter. Choose British Museum on audioguide.london and take a photo of it to hear this free audio guide in six languages — no app download needed.
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