Jilamara Arts is a remote Indigenous art centre in Milikapiti, Tiwi Islands
Jilamara Arts is a remote Indigenous art centre in Milikapiti, Tiwi Islands
Jilamara Arts is a remote Indigenous art centre in Milikapiti, Tiwi Islands
Jilamara Arts is a remote Indigenous art centre in Milikapiti, Tiwi Islands
Jilamara Arts is a remote Indigenous art centre in Milikapiti, Tiwi Islands
Jilamara Arts is a remote Indigenous art centre in Milikapiti, Tiwi Islands
Jilamara Arts is a remote Indigenous art centre in Milikapiti, Tiwi Islands
Jilamara Arts is a remote Indigenous art centre in Milikapiti, Tiwi Islands
Jilamara Arts is a remote Indigenous art centre in Milikapiti, Tiwi Islands
The art centre is the cultural hub of the community and houses working studios, wood carving and screen-printing workshops, the architecturally designed Kutuwulumi Gallery and the Muluwurri Museum
Our Latest Artwork
Ningiwulla ngirramini kitirumi yilaruwu jilamara
keeping culture strong through art
Our Art Centre
Established in 1989, Jilamara Arts is owned and governed by artists from the community of Milikapiti on the Tiwi Islands. Through workshops, training and representation Jilamara members are supported to build careers as internationally renowned artists. In the community it is an important place for many generations of Tiwi people to build bright futures.
Our Culture
Jilamara artists are known for their Tiwi style, producing contemporary works based on ceremonial body painting designs, clan totems and Tiwi creation stories.
Our Art
The term Jilamara describes “design” based on ceremonial ochre markings on the body. Reimagining these styles at the art centre has fostered a dynamic creative field for maintaining Tiwi knowledge, as well as sharing and celebrating contemporary living culture.
Wurrungura
Wurrungura is a multi-media centre and digital archive for the audiovisual documentation and distribution of Tiwi heritage and culture.
Muluwurri Museum
Established in 1988, the collection is held in trust for the Milikapiti community. This important keeping place houses the priceless collection of Tiwi artefacts, carvings, paintings, prints, photographs and war medals.
Ngawa Mantawi
Jilamara’s Ngawa Mantawi program is an inclusive disability program at the art centre, that aims to support members with diverse needs to have sustainable careers in the arts, while living at home close to family and Country.
https://captur3d.io/view/uplands/jilamara-arts-crafts-and-muluwurri-museum 
We are Aboriginal owned and we produce authentic Tiwi art – ironwood carved birds and Tutini poles, ochre paintings on bark, canvas, linen and paper, original limited edition prints and hand screenprinted textiles.
Be part of Jilamara's continued success and join our community of supporters by making a donation in the form on your left
We’re on social @jilamaraartsandcrafts
Pedro Wonaeamirri’s incredible “Ningarimi awarra Wujuwurri (History of Tiwi)” has just been installed at the Yiribana Gallery at the Art Gallery of New South Wales — North Terrace ✨✨✨
Produced as part of Pedro’s inaugural Lewin Residency at AGNSW in 2023, this work was inspired by time spent with the gallery’s Tiwi collection and celebrates the story of the first Tiwi family — Purrukuparli, Wai-ai, Jinani and Japarra — a powerful story of the first ever Pukumani (mourning) ceremony at Yimpanari (eastern Melville Island) and the coming of mortality to the Tiwi people.
📸 — Installation view of the Yiribana Gallery at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, photo ©️ Art Gallery of New South Wales, Jenni Carter
@artgalleryofnsw
#yiribanagallery #pedrowonaeamirri #jilamaraarts #tiwiart
It’s the last chance to see this incredible collection of works, including the Tiwi install in the first image featuring many Jilamara artists! Congratulations to everyone involved in this monumental exhibition ✨✨
Potter Museum of Art • @pottermuseum
🚨 FINAL DAYS! 🚨
Don’t miss out on visiting 65,000 Years: A Short History of Australian Art.
Open this weekend, 11am to 5pm.
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Image 1: Installation view of 65,000 Years: A Short History of Australian Art, Potter Museum of Art, the University of Melbourne, 2025. Photography by Christian Capurro.
Image 2-6: Installation view of 65,000 Years: A Short History of Australian Art, Potter Museum of Art, the University of Melbourne, 2025. Photography by Astrid Mulder.
Image 7: Installation view of 65,000 Years: A Short History of Australian Art, Potter Museum of Art, the University of Melbourne, 2025. Photography by James Henry.
Currently featuring in Awakening Histories at Monash University Museum of Art (MUMA):
“Kapala (Sailing Boat) Dance” 2024 — a collaboration between Colin Heenan-Puruntatameri and Michelle Pulatuwayu Woody Minnapinni
Single-channel video
Courtesy of the artists, Jilamara Arts and Wurrungura digital archive and knowledge centre. Photo: Andrew Curtis
This multi-media work depicts Michelle and Colin performing their family totem dance Kapala (sailing boat) on Wulirankuwu Country, Tiwi Islands. The dance marks the coming of Makassan sailing ships that arrived on the shores of the Tiwis many years before Dutch and English visitors. The dance and some shared language marks a complex trade relationship for many years between the close neighbours — a rich history denied at the federation of Australia.
@mumamonash
#jilamaraarts #wurrunga #colinheenanpuruntatameri #michellepulatuwayuwoodyminnapinni #kapala #awakeninghistories
It is the last 5 weeks to catch the amazing exhibition “to come together as water” at the University of Queensland Art Museum!
This incredible exhibition is brought together by curator Freya Carmichael and features the collaborative 4 channel multi-media work YOYI (dance) from Jilamara Arts ✨✨✨
There has been a great public program since the exhibition opened in July including Ultramarine Conversations last month where the amazing Michelle Pulatuwayu Woody Minnapinni and Colin Heenan-Puruntatameri travelled to Brisbane to talk about Jilamara’s contribution to the exhibition.
@uqartmuseum
#yoyi #jilamara #jilamaraartsandcrafts #tiwiart #tocometogetheraswater #uqartmuseum
It was great to be back in Adelaide last month to celebrate 10 years of Tarnanthi and some great Tiwi projects over the years! Including Paralika Tutini Jilamara in 2019 which showed 26 Tiwi tutini poles opened at the gallery with an unforgettable yoyi (dance) and the impressive wall of Tiwi ochre paintings on 500 gsm paper in 2021✨✨✨
A selection of both shows from the collection are currently on display in Too Deadly: Ten Years of Tarnanthi open at the gallery until January 18, 2026!
Art Gallery of South Australia • @agsa.adelaide
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Artists from three of the art centres on the Tiwi Islands – Munupi, Jilamara and Ngaruwanajirri – are united in this room. Tiwi ochre, in white, yellow and red, is carried across paper using brushes or pwoja, the ironwood combs that, through a rocking motion, press colour across a surface.
White ochre is collected from the cliff lines along the coast, yellow is found inland, while orange and red pigments are made by heating the yellow pigment. The heavy paper is comparable in size to the human torso onto which ceremonial designs, or jilamara, are painted.
The energy created by this display approximates the energy of Tiwi people singing and dancing, performing their traditional ceremonies known as Yoi.
Standing amongst these works are Tutini, burial poles central to the Pukamani ceremony, the final mortuary ritual ordered at the beginning of time (Palaneri) by the ancestral hero Purukuparli. Their painted jilamara designs, drawn from ancient body painting customs, disguise and protect against the spirits of the deceased. Once created for ceremonial use, these carved poles are now also powerful expressions of contemporary Tiwi art and culture.
See these works and more in Gallery 23b as part of Too Deadly: Ten Years of Tarnanthi until 18 Jan 2026.
📸 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 9: Photos by Saige Prime. 3: Johnathon W. Bush, Tiwi people, Untitled, 2021, Milikapiti, Melville Island, Northern Territory. 7-8: Timothy Cook, Tiwi people, Kulama, 2001, Milikapiti, Melville Island, Northern Territory. 10: Pedro Wonaeamirri, Tiwi people, Jilamara, 2021, Milikapiti, Melville Island, Northern Territory.
Currently showing in Brussels, Belgium “Between Salt and Ochre” — a group exhibition between Munupi and Jilamara Arts ✨✨✨
Aboriginal Signature Gallery • @aboriginal_signature_gallery
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Between Salt & Ochre — Painting the Sea, Revealing Country (Tiwi) - Aboriginal art from Australia (Jilamara et Munupi)
Aboriginal Signature Estrangin Gallery
Open to the public until November 15, 2025
101 rue Jules Besme, 1081 Bruxelles.
© Photo : Aboriginal Signature Estrangin Gallery with the courtesy of the artists and Munupi & Jilamara art centre.
#tiwiart #jilamaraarts #ochre
If you’re in Melbourne make sure you check out Walter Brook’s exceptional work “Wangatunga Jirtaka Jilamara (folded bark baskets with sawfish design)” still on display at NGV Australia: The Ian Potter Centre as part of the 2025 RIGG Design Prize ✨✨✨
For this project Walter worked with senior Jilamara artists Kenny Brown and Pedro Wonaeamirri to develop his skills creating tunga — ochre decorated folded bark baskets historically used by Tiwi people both practically to carry food and water, but also in ceremony as a gift to ancestors during Pukumani.
@ngvmelbourne #riggdesignprize2025 #walterbrooks #jilamaraarts #tiwiart #tunga #ochrecolours
To celebrate the 2021 Tarnanthi install of Tiwi ochres on paper at the Art Gallery of South Australia we’ve brought an amazing selection of work on paper to the Tarnanthi Art Fair✨✨✨
Open tonight from 5pm at Union House at the University of Adelaide North Terrace. Jilamara has a booth on level 6. The fair is also open tomorrow Saturday 18th feom 10am until 8pm!
@tarnanthi #tarnanthiartfair #jilamara #jilamaraarts #tiwiart #ochre
Great to be back on Kaurna Country in Adelaide with Jilamara crew for the 10th Tarnanthi at Art Gallery of South Australia!
The publication and exhibition “Too Deadly: Ten Years of Tarnanthi” is a great chance to reflect on the amazing projects that have been realised through this event over the years. Of note from the Tiwi Islands — the 2019 exhibition of 26 carved ironwood tutini poles and 2021 collective hang of ochres on paper from across the islands, a selection of which made it to the collection and are displayed again this year ✨✨✨
#tarnanthi #agsa #jilamaraarts #tiwiart #tiwiislands
Johnathon World Peace Bush is currently in a range of art award finalist exhibitions across the country. Here’s a quick recap from his amazing gallery team at This Is No Fantasy ✨✨✨
This Is No Fantasy • @thisisnofantasy
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ＰＲＩＺＥＳ ＋ ＡＷＡＲＤＳ
Congratulations to Johnathon World Peace Bush, who has recently been nationally recognised for his outstanding work 🏆️
Johnathon has recently been awarded Highly Commended at the Telstra NATSIAA’s in the Multimedia Category, and Highly Commended at the Girra: Fraser Coast National Art Prize!
His work has also been selected as a finalist in the Mosman Art Prize, Calleen Art Award, Fremantle Print Award, and the Fisher’s Ghost Art Award!
🧡 Congratulations Johnathon! 🧡
Please email info@thisisnofantasy.com to register your interest
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#thisisnofantasy #johnathonworldpeacebush @jilamaraartsandcrafts
1. Johnathon World Peace Bush, Burke and Wills, 2024, locally sourced earth pigments on linen, 120 x 120 cm. Highly Commended - Girra: Fraser Coast National Art Prize @herveybayregionalgallery
2. Johnathon World Peace Bush, Let There Be Light (polyptych), 2024 (detail), 53 x 39 cm each, Ed. of 20. Finalist - Fremantle Print Award @fremantleartscentre
3. Johnathon World Peace Bush, Joan of Arc (Arika), 2025, locally sourced earth pigments on linen, single-channel looped video, 225 x 130 x 12 cm. Highly Commended - Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Awards 2025 @mag_nt
4. Johnathon World Peace Bush, Mother Teresa (Peace), 2025, locally sourced earth pigments on linen, 120 x 120 cm. Finalist - Fisher’s Ghost Art Award 2025 @campbelltownartscentre
5. Johnathon World Peace Bush, Pope Francis, 2024, locally sourced earth pigments on linen, 120 x 150 cm. Finalist - Mosman Art Prize @mosmanart
6. Johnathon World Peace Bush, Queen Victoria II, 2024, locally sourced earth pigments on linen, 150 x 120 cm. Finalist - Calleen Art Award @cowraregionalartgallery
Walter Brooks with his amazing work Wangatunga Jirtaka Jilamara (folded bark baskets with sawfish design) in the Rigg Design Prize at NGV Australia open to the public from today ✨✨✨
Congratulations to all the finalists and Alfred Lowe @aforalfie for being awarded the prize last night!
If you are in Melbourne and want to hear Walter talk about his project and work please come and join his artist talk tomorrow Saturday 20th Sept at 11am — level 3 NGV Australia Ian Potter Centre at Fed Square.
Photo: Tim Carrafa @timcarrafa
@ngvmelbourne
#walterbrooks #jilamaraarts #tiwiart #tunga
We are a long way from collecting Stringybark with Kenny Brown on Wulirankuwu Country, but Walter Brooks is in Melbourne this week to celebrate an amazing intergenerational project. A selection of ochre painted tunga (folded stringybark baskets) that he made under the mentorship of Kenny Brown and Pedro Wonaeamirri are featured in this year’s RIGG Design Prize at NGV Australia.
Congratulations to all the fellow finalists!
The Rigg Design Prize 2025 is announced this week and opens 19 September at NGV Australia.
Now in its 10th edition, this landmark exhibition celebrates 35 exceptional Australian designers under 35, working across ceramics, glass, furniture, woodwork, metalwork, textiles, lighting, and contemporary jewellery.
Experience the free exhibition, Rigg Design Prize 2025 - Next in Design: 35 under 35 and celebrate the creative excellence of Australia’s early career designers and makers.
With thanks to Major Partner
@deakinuniversity and Major Supporter Cicely & Colin Rigg Bequest managed by Equity Trustees.
@ngvmelbourne #riggdesignprize2025
Images 1/2: courtesy of the artist and Jilamara Arts. Photo: @willheathcote_art
Image3 : Olive Gill-Hille, Haptic, 2023 (detail) © Olive Gill-Hille. Photo:
Simon Hewson
Another amazing Jilamara Fashion show at the Artback NT Milikapiti Festival on the weekend✨✨✨
I was so great to share this project locally in Milikapiti after winning the National Indigenous Fashion Community Collaboration Award (NIFA) at Darwin’s Deckchair Cinema last month. These amazing garments are made for the community at the art centre by local staff using re-instated screen designs from Jilamara’s origins in the mid 1980s as an adult education centre specialising in textile arts. The project is a great celebration of the breadth of amazing work produced by dedicated people at community governed arts organisations like Jilamara!
@artback_nt
#jilamaraarts #artbacknt #tiwiislands #milikapitifestival
“You call us artists, but we are story-tellers and we tell our stories through art.” — Colin-Heenan Puruntatameri
Wurrungura — Jilamara’s digital archive and multimedia project is not just about digitising older images and producing new multimedia artworks, the team have also been working on documenting community stories and developing translations in Tiwi language.
Here the team are in the art centre’s Muluwurri Museum documenting stories and songs in Tiwi language from senior artist Pedro Wonaeamirri for an upcoming publication.
#jilamaraarts #wurrungura #tiwiart #tiwistorytelling
Johnathon Bush current finalist in the Fraser Coast National Art Prize! Congratulations mantani ✨✨✨
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Finalist - Girra: Fraser Coast National Art Prize 2025
Hervey Bay Regional Gallery
Congratulations and good luck to Johnathon World Peace Bush, who has been selected as one of 16 finalists in the 2025 Girra Prize with his work ‘Burke and Wills’!
At first glance ‘Burke and Wills (statues)’ depicts the first explorers, who in 1861 traversed Australia from the south coast to the Gulf of Carpentaria, as whimsical, even humorous caricatures, but on deeper reflection, they appear as ominous portents of what was to come, heavily defined, embedded, even gouged into a serene backdrop. A far more malevolent force is at play, as these were the first explorers to open up the land to future graziers, foreshadowing calamity that would change the course of history for the First Nations people who had inhabited the land for over 60,000 years.
The 2025 Girra: Fraser Coast National Art Prize exhibition will be held at @herveybayregionalgallery from 23 August to 12 November 2025.
Congratulations to all of the selected finalists:
Lino Ah-Honi | Ariella Anderson | Amanda Bennetts | Jacqueline Bradley | Johnathon World Peace Bush | Shoufay Derz | Christophe Domergue | Claire Ellis | Baylee Griffin | Georgia Hayward | Joseph Williams Jungararyi | Ingvar Kenne | Anna May Kirk | Aaron Perkins | Brian Robinson | Paul Snell
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#thisisnofantasy #johnathonworldpeacebush @thisisnofantasy
Johnathon World Peace Bush, Walking Between Two Worlds, 2025, Frieze No.9 Cork Street, London UK
Darwin Aboriginal Art Fair Online still open still until tomorrow!
We may have deinstalled both DAAF and the annual Tiwi exhibition at Double Tree Hilton tonight, but for those that could not be in Darwin there’s a few amazing Jilamara carvings and ochre paintings on paper still available through the art fair’s online portal closing tomorrow morning.
@darwinartfair
#darwinaboriginalartfair #daafonline #jilamaraarts #tiwiart
We have had another amazing weekend at the Darwin Aboriginal Art Fair. The fair closes today but there’s still time to look at DAAF online. There’s a great selection of carved birds and paintings on paper available that we can ship next week!
Repost from @darwinartfair
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The legendary Tiwi singers & dancers from Munupi and Jilamara Arts and Crafts have been winning over the crowds once again at the DAAF Sandpit.
Thanks for getting us up for a dance!
2025.daaf.com.au
@munipiarts @jilamaraartsandcrafts
📷 Photos by Dylan Buckee
#DAAF2025 #DARWINARTFAIR
Darwin Aboriginal Art Fair (DAAF) Foundation’s Public Program is proudly supported by the Northern Territory Government through Northern Territory Major Events Company, Copyright Agency Cultural Fund, Wesfarmers, Agency Projects, premium media partner Peppermint Magazine, and ticketing partner Darwin Fringe Festival.
Last day of the annual Tiwi exhibition at the Double Tree Hilton Darwin Esplanade today!
This great celebration of Tiwi art from Melville Island opened with Tiwi Yoyi (dance) on Friday and closes this afternoon at 5pm. If you are lucky enough to be in Darwin this week come and visit!
Kimirrakinari (the season of smoke) — Jilamara and Munupi Arts, part of the Darwin Festival program.
116 The Esplanade, Darwin City (in the breezeway between Darwin Entertainment Centre and the Hilton)
@darwinfestival
#jilamaraartsandcrafts #tiwiart #darwinfestival
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The art centre is the cultural hub of Milikapiti Community, it is also an important place for local school children to learn through culture classes and for many generations of Tiwi people to build bright futures.
