napuwarri-marawili
Homeland: Yilpara
Clan: Maḏarrpa
Moiety: Yirritja
Napuwarri is the third son and fourth child of the great artist Bakulaŋay Marawili. In the last years of his father’s life it was he who worked most closely on art with him. They completed a number of collaborative works together. He follows many of his father’s stylistic features and was endorsed as a legitimate artist of his clan’s sacred designs by his father before his death. Napuwarri first came to wider attention in the Yakumirri exhibition at Raft artspace in Darwin. The Holmes a Court Collection bought this set of paintings in its entirety. He is an adaptable man with a versatile range of artistic skills. As well as dancing and singing in ceremony he sculpts as well as makes prints. As a young man he travelled to the east coast and worked as a carpenter and married to a Queensland Indigenous woman from Cairns and had two children before he moved back to North east Arnhem land. He has strong links to Numbulwar through his second wife Rita and from his early years spent there as Bakulangay’s family was one of the last of the Madarrpa to move back to their homeland of Yilpara in the 1980s. Napuwarri worked for Buku-Larrnggay Mulka for two years before returning to Yilpara to live in 2006. His first solo show was at Suzanne O’Connell Gallery in 2008. The National Gallery of Australia bought two works from this show. The Kerry Stokes Collection has also acquired his work. In 2018 Napuwarri won the prize for Best bark painting in the 35th NATSIAA awards , he sung his manikay to the crowd as he accepted this award and the bark was acquired by the Kluge Ruhe in the USA.
