Central Desert artists visit local gallery

Two Central Desert artists, Billy and Lulu Cooley, visited the Bouddi Gallery on June 15 and 16 to meet residents of the Central Coast and demonstrate their painting skills.

Billy Cooley is internationally famous for his realistic, life size liru (venomous snake) carvings and Lulu for her piti and wira (carved wooden bowls).

Billy and Lulu are also well known for their walka boards, a painting and etching method using hot wire, developed by the artists at Maruku Arts (Uluru).

Lulu said she remembered learning her carving skills from her mother and other female relatives in the 1960s.

Since Creation, women have been responsible for making their own wooden tools, most importantly the digging stick and collecting bowls, she said.

They must also learn designs relating to ceremony and storytelling for country and kinship.

Lulu said long and close observation of her mother's work led to her distinctive scallop style.

Now a consummate carver of many years' experience, Lulu specialises mainly in piti and wira, traditional bowls, as well as punu timpilypa - music or clap sticks.

She works closely with her husband Billy and is the grandmother of 10 children who she helps raise at Ulpaia in the Musgrave ranges.

Billy was born on a cattle station near the Northern Territory and Queensland borders and now lives with his Pitjantjatjara wife, Lulu, and six children on their homeland near the South Australian community of Amata.

In his younger years, Billy was an accomplished stockman, travelling widely and eventually meeting Lulu at Mulga Park Station.

Billy found himself at home on the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Lands and began to make kali (boomerangs) from the desert mulga trees after watching some of the older local Anangu people crafting snakes.

When he began carving in earnest, he said he wanted to make his liru (snake) sculptures as life-like as possible so he started to watch out for naturally occurring serpent forms in the twisting roots and branches he came across in the landscape.

He said he also made careful study of the different scale patterns of desert serpents and, over the years, he arrived at four etching styles to replicate different snakes.

Billy has exhibited widely since 1990, including in Japan and both the National Gallery of Australia and the National Museum of Australia have acquired his work.

Email, 10 Jun 2013

Jody Deamer, Bouddi Gallery