More than just traditional ‘totemic’ representations, native animals play a vital role in many First Nations relationships to Country, spirituality, and to themselves.

In Yorta Yorta Culture all plants and animals are significant, but those relative to healthy waterways hold a particularly high status. Bayadherra (Broad-shelled Turtle) is seen as ‘a provider, guide and protector’, while other water animals such as the Buranga (Murray Cod) and the Borpa (Crayfish), and water birds like the Nurnamamdatba (Kingfisher) are, too, highly revered. (i)

In the painting Long Neck Turtles, Yorta Yorta artist B. Brown adopts the long-necked turtle to represent himself and his family. ‘This is me and my 5 kids,’ he states of his painting, ‘and the journey path and meeting points of the three mothers’.

The affinity with a particular animal found on Yorta Yorta Country is represented in the work by Barry Atkinson titled Snake Connection. ‘As a child, one of the first animals I came across was a red belly black snake eating a brown snake and that fascinated me,’ Barry explains. ‘Since then, I have always come across snakes when I’m on Country and never once has one tried to get me. It’s like I have a connection with snakes. I just stand still and watch them and they watch me too, but then just slither away.’

In Echidna Dreaming, Alex E (Yorta Yorta/Wemba Wemba peoples) utilises the echidna to reflect his own memories of his childhood self. ‘This is Edwards the echidna. He represents me as a young fella as I was cheeky and shy but always down for some tucker. Everyone used to laugh at him because he was different.’

For these three artists, each representation of an animal in their art is both symbolic but also quite literal. Bill Mansfield’s Mother Nature however, takes a wholly different approach; becoming an abstract depiction of ‘Mother Nature blending in with wildlife’ he says. The conceptual blending of Country and animals, of Mother Nature and the wildlife she creates, is a testament to the inseparability of animals with the self in Yorta Yorta art and Culture. To put it plainly, one simply cannot exist without the other.

Reference:
i: With thanks to Draft Joint Management Plan for Barmah National Park, Yorta Yorta TOLM & YYNAC, 2019, p.23