Mimpu (Water Bowl)

Buy a beautiful work from our this years Telstra finalist Cynthia Burke.

The mimpu or deep wooden water carrying bowl is a traditional woman’s vessel designed especially for transporting water. It usually carved from a knot or scar on the trunk of a Desert Bloodwood or a curved root section of the River Red Gum tree. Contemporary artists use walka, patterns burnt into the wood with wire heated on a wood fire. These relate Tjukurpa, stories about the Tjukuritja  or Creation Ancestors and the activities which shaped the land, the people and their Law. Many of the details of Tjukurpa are restricted to senior custodians so it is not possible to describe the full story behind the walka.

Kapi tjukurla are the waterholes represented by circles. By their very nature waterholes also mark sites related to the Creation Ancestors’ journeys across the country; the ‘dreaming tracks’ followed by countless generations since.

“I learned burning by watching my mother and other family members. The designs of my family and watching nature helped me to develop my own designs. I enjoy the burning process and how my designs grow on the wood. In the old days Yarnangu walked around from waterhole to waterhole to survive and by doing so followed the ancestral tracks. I like to represent and remember this on my sculptures.” Cynthia Burke

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