by Tamara Newton
In early September 2023, a delegation of three Anindilyakwa representatives – Senior Elder Noeleen Lalara, and Emerging Leaders Amethea Mamarika and Maicie Lalara – travelled from Groote Eylandt, Northern Australia, to receive the formal return of 174 heritage materials held at Manchester Museum, England.
In the museum’s Living Worlds gallery, Esme Ward, Director of Manchester Museum, welcomed and introduced various speakers: Stephen Smith, Australian High Commissioner to the United Kingdom; Professor Dame Nancy Rothwell, President and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Manchester; Krista Pikkat, Unesco’s Director for Culture and Emergencies; and Leonard Hill, AIATSIS acting CEO. They all spoke about the significance of this occasion for the Anindilyakwa community and Australia, and for future cases of museum repatriation. With Amethea and Maicie at either side, Noeleen Lalara expressed thanks to Manchester Museum and the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS),
I’ve got nothing much to say because I’m emotional now, but thank you so much, every one of you, working here, AIATSIS. I am happy and proud for my people.
With the sound of traditional Anindilyakwa music playing softly, Lalara began to cry as she spoke, saturating the gallery with a wave of empathy. Noeleen, Amethea and Maicie then presented a gift to Manchester Museum; a box with newly created Dadikwakwa-kwa doll shells – 14 doll shells to represent the 14 clans of the Groote Eylandt Northern Territory. Esme Ward and Georgina Young came towards the podium to accept the gift, and Noeleen, Amethea and Maicie hugged Esme & Georgina in an embrace demonstrating the earnest connection formed between the companions.
Over the past three years, Manchester Museum staff members have been working with AIATSIS and the Anindilyakwa Land Council to further discern the materials held in the museum’s collections, build longstanding relationships based on trust with Anindilyakwa community members, and understand how Anindilyakwa members wanted to proceed. Manchester Museum’s Alexandra Alberda (Curator of Indigenous Perspectives), Georgina Young (Head of Exhibitions and Collections), and Njabulo Chipangura (Curator of Living Cultures) travelled to Groote Eylandt for in-Country consultations with Senior Anindilyakwa Elders so members of the community could engage with the Worsley Collection via laptops and photographs; Alex answered questions about the objects’ size, their weight, and how it feels to hold them in her hands. Manchester Museum and AIATSIS’s methodology involved in-depth collaborative research to create spaces where custodians make informed decisions about the future care of their cultural heritage.[1]
AIATSIS formed the Return of Cultural Heritage Project (RoCH) from July 2018 – June 2020, as a pilot initiation in which AIATSIS ‘scoped, researched and repatriated cultural heritage material from overseas collecting institutions to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities in Australia’.[2] Through the RoCH project, AIATSIS has been working with the Anindilyakwa Land Council to organise and facilitate the return of Anindilyakwa material from Manchester Museum. Materials from the Worsley Collection to be returned include: enungkuwa (spears), ajamurnda (bark baskets), errumungkwa (woven armbands) and Dadikwakwa-kwa (painted doll shells).[3]
Dadikwakwa-kwa (shell dolls). Photo: © Michael Pollard, Manchester Museum, 2022.
Of the 174 materials being returned, the main highlight were the Dadikwakwa-kwa – Anindilyakwa dolls made from local shells. Dadikwakwa-kwa making is taught by grandmothers to their granddaughters; when the grandmother passes away, the granddaughter buries the materials with her grandmother.
“When I grew up, I took all the materials from them, I put them in a small bag and I kept them. I took all the shells back, back to where they belong,” Edith points towards the beach behind her, “I’ve still got the bag, until my grandmother passed away. When she was buried, I threw that bag into her grave because my grandmother taught me how to play with it.” – Edith Mamarika.
Senior Warnindilyakwa woman, Edith Mamarika, also known as Old Lady Edith (a term of respect) explained that her father, Minimini, would paint the shells for her with pigments made from quarries on the island that are processed by Anindilyakwa men working at the Men’s shed. In the past, men would paint barks and other objects and women created fibre art, however, contemporary practices concerning shell dolls have seen women undertaking the painting. Milli Mamarika and Jennie Barabara recalled playing with the shell dolls at old Umbakumba camp; together, they remembered playing on the beach with dolls, draping them with pieces of fabric “to clothe the people”. The Dadikwakwa-kwa are dressed in hand-dyed silk, bush-dyed cloth, and the Anindilyakwa artists create and dye bush string with local plant dyes. The cloth used were offcuts from settlement and mission stores, which were chosen and decorated by fathers for their daughters and representing the Anindilyakwa clan designs.
Noeleen Danjibana Lalara holding shells from the Dadikwakwa-kwa. © Anindilyakwa Arts. Anindilyakwa Land Council, 2023
The Dadikwakwa-kwa traditionally represent the 14 clans of Groote Eylandt and were used by parents and children to understand Anindilyakwa clan and kinship system. The dolls would exemplify a family unit: the largest doll being the father, the medium-sized doll being the mother, and smaller ones the children. In the past, a large shell could have many medium-sized shells and little shells, but not anymore. In this way, the Anindilyakwa kinship system could be played out with dolls and internalised by young girls. In a short video, Old Lady Edith demonstrated how she played with her dalyaurruwara:
“Here’s a man and a woman. They were sitting closely with each other and a[nother] woman. This woman had two kids,” as she places two smaller shells next to the man and woman. “And she had one. And this one, she’s an old lady, mother of these two ladies. These two young girls are visitors, they come and visit them every morning and sit with them. Husband for these two ladies, and their father too”, Edith indicates to two family units. She then arranged eight shells and a stick encircled around a turtle, “That’s the turtle here in the middle, they’re having lunch, turtle meat.” Edith lays the shells flat on their back, one by one, and says “they’re all asleep now, because they’re full.”
© Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford, Playing in the sand, photographed by Peter Worsley, 1952-1953, 2009.10.110 https://www.prm.ox.ac.uk/collections-online#/item/prm-object-425221
Senior Artist and Lead Arts & Culture Officer, Noeleen Lalara, explained the familial and cultural significance of the Dadikwakwa-kwa. They’re not just shells – they have spirits inside of them. You can talk to them, and they can respond. If you put them on the wall or in your collections and talk to them, they will talk to you, but you must believe and trust them. The Dadikwakwa-kwa keep everything for the Anindilyakwa – knowledge, stories and meaning – because the spirits are everywhere on the Eylandt and made with everything from the Eylandt. Noeleen is interested in telling stories of the old time. The doll shells have lots of stories and meaning that they share so it is not forgotten – as a result, it’s coming back to life now and will continue as such forever. At the moment, just a few of the old ladies remember the doll shells. But people are excited to bring the doll shells back for teaching and storytelling so people can remember things from the past, which is important so Anindilyakwa people can keep following the footsteps. Lalara also expressed that the Dadikwakwa-kwa are a special kind of shell. People used to play with them, use them for literacy and numeracy; children would put the doll shells in the coolamon and carry two, three, or four, because they have two or three wives and many children, so they would copy their own family unit.
Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford, Girls playing with shell dolls, photographed by Peter Worsley, 1952-1953, 2009.10.249, https://www.prm.ox.ac.uk/collections-online#/item/prm-object-425360
Artist and Arts & Culture Officer (Umbakumba), Maicie Lalara described how the shell dolls are from the olden days of her ancestors who didn’t have anything to play with, so they played with shell dolls, wrapping them in fabric and painting them. The ancestors didn’t make them for a long time, but now, in the new year, Anindilyakwa community members are making the shell dolls again. Maicie said she had never seen a shell doll before, and only her elders played with them, but now they can create their own. Anindilyakwa artists have been weaving around the shell dolls with pandanus and painting patterns on them in ochre; combining old ways and new ways of style.
As a result of sharing stories and personal memories of the shell dolls, Noeleen Lalara and the Anindilyakwa women’s art programme have formulated a reinvigoration of this artistic practice with younger Umbakumba and Angurugu artists and children who are interested in learning more about the shell dolls. The women went to Eight Mile beach to collect the shells, and many have been painted and decorated by Anindilyakwa people. Now, ten female artists from the Anindilyakwa Arts are finalists in the 2023 Telstra NATSIAA (National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Awards) for their creation of 196 shell dolls arranged in a 14 x 14 grid to represent the fourteen clans. The shell dolls are adorned with earth pigments, native seeds, mangkurrka (pandanus), malbalba (bush string, stringy bark), human hair, gum leaf, sand, synthetic polymer paint, glue, cotton string, and wire.
Further to this achievement, Noeleen, Amethea and Maicie and the Anindilyakwa Arts programme organised two Dadikwakwa-kwa making workshops at Manchester Museum, open exclusively to women and girls. Here, attendants were invited to sit on floor cushions and observe Noeleen, Amethea and Maicie share how they like to decorate the shells brought over from Groote Eylandt. Attendants shared the natural materials and paints provided to create their own shell dolls. The Anindilyakwa ladies taught us how to use the paints, wrap the home-made silks around the shells, and their favourite patterns for decorating. We shared who we were making our dolls for, compared painting patterns and admired one another’s techniques for details such as adding hair, facial features, arms & legs, and accessories. Maicie taught me how to weave bush string onto my shell dolls using a crochet needle, and, when requested, she turned other attendant’s shells into pendants by weaving together natural string.
Photos by author, 2023.
The practice of making Dadikwakwa-kwa slowed down between the 1950s to present day; this is believed to be due to Missions in Australia forcibly assimilating Aboriginal Australian people into the colonial regime. This assimilation included removing children from their homes, conversion to Christianity, not being allowed to speak their native language, nor teaching children cultural practices. Now, however, Anindilyakwa artists have revived this traditional custom, resulting in the Anindilyakwa Arts receiving their first nomination at the NATSIAA and forging international connections to share their unique artistic skills, with further discussions to collaborate with doll makers in Namibia.
Aboriginal Australian people are recognised to have inhabited Country up to 75,000 years ago, making them one of the oldest living, continuous cultures.[4] The Warnindilyakwa people have occupied Groote Eylandt for 8,000 years; the Nunggubuyu people were invited by the Warnindilyakwa to migrate to Groote Eylandt in the second half of the 18th century.[5] The Anindilyakwa Land Council explain how Anindilyakwa people were ‘brought to Groote Eylandt on a series of song lines, which created the land, rivers, animals and people, and named everything pertaining to the region, as well as laying down rules of marriage, kinship and ceremonial law’.[6] When Anindilyakwa people say “culture”, it is an inseparable concept from Country and the Anindilyakwa peoples’ spiritual relationship to the spaces. This can include seas, cosmology, landscapes, people, flora, and fauna; they are all an interconnected whole.[7]
The Dadikwakwa-kwa shell dolls are created by Anindilyakwa people using shells formed by molluscs, painted with pigments from local quarries, clothed with hand-woven silk coloured with indigenous plant dyes, adorned with native dye bush string, played in a manner representing Anindilyakwa kinships, and imbued with the spirits of ancestors who retain knowledge and stories of old times. Every element – from the materials’ source, their playful utilisation, the inter-generational pedagogy, relationship-fortification, ancestral wisdom, and their eventual return to the Land – conveys the deep harmony between Dadikwakwa-kwa, Anindilyakwa people, and Country as an inseparable synthesis.
This synthesis continues within the Dadikwakwa-kwa’s travels to Manchester and their recent return. The Anindilyakwa materials held at Manchester Museum were donated by Professor Peter Worsley, who worked and lived on Groote Eylandt in the 1950s with his wife. The Worsley Collection has been in Manchester Museum’s possession for more than 40 years. His diaries indicate that Worsley bought or traded the materials with Anindilyakwa people whilst he was studying for an anthropology PhD at the Australian National University on a three-year scholarship. Originally Worsley applied to study for 12 months in New Guinea but was refused by the Minister for Territories Paul Hasluck because “a great deal of mischief could be done to natives and the Administration by people holding certain views … his presence there would not be desirable”; it is believed the refusal was due to the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation’s (ASIO) understanding of Worsley’s membership to the Communist Party. After an unsuccessful appeal to the Minister for Territories, Worlsey conducted his research on Groote Eylandt instead. His PhD focused on the “sophisticated and changeable kinship relations systems of the Anindilyakwa people”. He returned to England in 1954 where he taught at the University of Hull, then became professor of sociology at the University of Manchester. He retired in 1982 and passed away in March 2013.[8]
When Worsley boarded the R.M.S. Oronsay in 1954, headed to London from Sydney, it is reported in the ASIO’s archive that he was accompanied by his wife and an infant, aged four months old – Deborah Worsley.[9] Based on this timeline, Deborah would have been conceived and born during Sheila and Peter Worsley’s time on Groote Eylandt, and travelled back to England with the same Dadikwakwa-kwa shell dolls that were handed over to Anindilyakwa representatives at Manchester Museum in 2023. Deborah attended the Handover Ceremony, expressing her support that “he [Peter Worsley] would be so thrilled. I feel so, so proud today,” and met with Amethea, Noeleen and Maicie.[10] Here, Amethea Mamarika told us some of the shell dolls in the Worsley Collection were created by her grandmother, Edith Mamarika.
Maicie Lalara, Deborah Worsley, Amethea Mamarika, and Noeleen Lalara at Manchester Museum, 3 September 2023. Photo: The Guardian
Peter Worsley’s affiliation with the Communist Party blocked his ability to undergo his initial intended research but this resulted in an unexpected, unifying international journey. Living and researching on Groote Eylandt led to the birth of Deborah Worsley who accompanied the Dadikwakwa-kwa doll shells on their journey to England, she then witnessed the Handover Ceremony to Anindilyakwa representatives and met the descendants of the same individuals whom Peter Worsley would have interacted with in 1952.
The synchronism between the Dadikwakwa-kwa, Anindilyakwa people, Country, and now Peter Worsley and Manchester Museum, embodies an inextricably entangled cosmos that has reawakened a culturally profound artistic practice, that can now continue to be explored further by the Anindilyakwa community.
[1] Ophelia Rubinich, https://webcast.unesco.org/events/2023-06-ReturnRestitution/ Video of UNESCO New forms of agreements and cooperation in the field of return and restitution of cultural property – minutes, 2:17:00, 27 June 2023
[2] Iain G. Johnston, Tamarind Meara, Lyndall Ley, Christopher Simpson, Jason Lyons, Rose Rutherford, Diana Quadri, ‘The AIATSIS Return of Cultural Heritage Project: Understanding Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Cultural Heritage Material Held Overseas and the Initial Challenges to Repatriating Material to Custodians’, October 2021, p. 653.
[3] AIATSIS, ‘Anindilyakwa cultural heritage material come home to Australia from Manchester Museum, United Kingdom’, 6 September 2023 https://aiatsis.gov.au/whats-new/news/anindilyakwa-cultural-heritage-material-come-home-australia-manchester-museum-united
[4] ‘Anthropology’, Anindilyakwa Land Council https://anindilyakwa.com.au/preserving-culture/anthropology/
[5] ‘History’, Anindilyakwa Land Council https://anindilyakwa.com.au/about/history/
[6] ‘History’, Anindilyakwa Land Council https://anindilyakwa.com.au/about/history/
[7] ‘Anthropology’, Anindilyakwa Land Council https://anindilyakwa.com.au/preserving-culture/anthropology/
[8] AIATSIS, ‘MS 1857: Peter Worsley; fieldwork with Anindilyakwa people on Groote Eylandt, 1952-1953’, p. 8.
[9] National Archives of Australia, ‘Peter Maurice Worsley, 1949-1959, Series number: A6119, Control symbol: 431, Item ID: 12140492, page 10. https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=12140492 [accessed 15 September 2023]
[10] Mark Brown, ‘Manchester Museum hands back 174 objects to Indigenous Australian islanders’, The Guardian, 5 September 2023, https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/sep/05/manchester-museum-hands-back-objects-to-indigenous-australian-anindilyakwa [accessed 10 September 2023]
Tamara Newton, a PhD History of Art researcher at the University of Birmingham, is exploring museum object repatriation practices within the UK. Their research investigates successful methodologies, areas for improvement, and the impact of cultural revitalisation for stakeholder communities. They aim to formulate a repatriation framework to practically guide museums and highlight the importance of heritage returns to source communities. Additionally, they explore artistic intervention and new mediation methodologies as means to further expand the concept of repatriation.