• Red, White & Black Ochre

Yidumduma collects the white ochre galyji, red ochre liwin, and black charcoal minyardin and teaches us the ceremonial use of the colours. White is used to paint up the men and women for the Wangga and Warranggin ceremony, black and white for the women for their Bandimi and red and white for the men for their Gujingga ceremony. The ochres and their Law teachings were left in sacred site deposits and then in rock art by the Ancestors. They are also used for trading with their neighbours.

• Related Links:   

• Diving for Red Ochre

• Paint & Wangga Dance

• Intro to Land & Culture

• Transcript

This one here is called galyji,

white one, white paint.

Come out of the creek.

He’s not hard like a rock.

This one is a real soft one.

…today I…pick him up like this,

and I’ll pour him all out here.

Now with this galyji,

you might see one little one like that.

This little one can paint 

biggest mob, like this.

That’s really stuck there…

That’s galyji,

…another little one,

you can put him on there again.

Very rich pigment, this one.

The mob like this little one 

you see here,

that can paint twenty people,

in the body painting,

when you wet him.

That’s in a Wangga song

when you paint all in white,

in a Wangga.

Or in a Warranggin, also all in white,

but in Bandimi 

all the women use it for 

black and white.

This red ochre, liwin

we use for Gujingga.

For Gujingga, red ochre,

and white ochre. 

That’s the red ochre…putting on.

That’s the red ochre

for the Gujingga song.

When you have a red,

and you have a white.

This white one here 

you can just draw him on.

And this will never wash off.

This will stay here 

until the flood water come,

he won’t get washed out, 

he’ll be still here.

Because this pigment,

this white one he’s in the creek,

and he don’t get washed off,

and the red one too,

he don’t get washed off.

Now here, that’s a mens one 

with the Gujingga,

red and white.

This is a woman one, Minyardin,

black and white.

Beautiful black charcoal.

This is black and white

for all the women.

We never waste them,

just throw them…like this.

Now what I’ve got to do

…make it like a little damper.

I just wet it…

You can see the steam 

coming out of him…

Just put them together,

that way, when he go hard 

he stay like that in a big lump…

And that’s the way he stay.

That’s how they make him a big mob,

go down and make a big collection.

Put him back like this.

Make them about this long,

some of them, that wide.

We use it…all the trading.