Hedley Brian, Merlemerle (Butterfly)

Artist: Hedley Brian
Title: Merlemerle (Butterfly)
Year: 2024
Materials: Carved Wooden Sculpture with ochre pigment
Size: 300mm x 270mm x 130mm

Hedley Brian is the younger brother of acclaimed senior artist Lena Yarinkura. He works across many areas in the community including as a community development supervisor. Hedley’s homeland is around the Ankabarrbirri outstation and his clan, Bununggu.

Hedley’s art is playful, experimental and has a great sense of joy about it, as seen in this series of Merlemerle (Butterflies).

Hedley also has incredible knowledge of native bush-foods of Arnhem Land and their uses. 'My mum showed me how to dig and cook bush food, and when I used to go hunting with my brother at around 14 years old, we used to eat these. Now I show my own grandson how to gather bush food. We know how the land works as well: where to find different foods, when to do burning so that they grow back fresh and healthy. We want to have lots of bush food because it’s good for us, and it makes us healthy.  It’s important to us to look after the land so that it can look after us.'

Maningrida Arts & Culture is a pre-eminent site of contemporary cultural expression and art-making, abundant with highly collectable art and emerging talent.

Through their homelands resource organisation, Bawinanga Aboriginal Corporation, artists turned an art trade that began just over 50 years ago into a multi-million dollar arts and cultural enterprise. Maningrida Arts & Culture supported hundreds of artists on their homelands, more than 20 artworkers, held 20 exhibitions annually, won prestigious awards, and enjoyed the international fame and success that the boom in the Aboriginal art market of the 1990s and 2000s enabled.

Acclaimed senior artists including Owen Yalandja, Ivan Namirrkki, Janet Marawarr, Lena Yarinkura and Jack Nawilil continue to expand their mediums and narratives. Artists such as Paul Nabulumo, Samson Bonson, Anniebelle Marrngamarrnga, Serena Bonson, Jeremiah Bonson, and Fiona Jin-majinggal have emerged to become a formidable force in the national and international landscape. They sit alongside the leading proponents of a fibre sculpture movement. Doreen Jinggarrabarra, Freda Wayartja Ali, Bonnie Burarn.garra, Dorothy Bunibuni, Lorna Jin-gubarrangunyja, Marina Murdilnga, Frewa Bardaluna, Helen Stewart and Vera Cameron.