Wukuṉ Waṉambi's oeuvre, whether on bark, ḻarrakitj, prints, video or etched metal, represents a profound meditation on the nature of life and death, forged in the intersection of cultures. Wukuṉ liked to say that his paintings were an attempt to “break down” Yolŋu theology into simple parcels that uninformed ŋäpaki’ (non-Yolŋu) could understand. Viewing them, he would say, is like looking at the surface of the waters. There are depths that you cannot see: an entire ocean of knowledge hidden from ŋäpaki’ eyes.

One of Wukun’s favorite analogies when describing the actions of the mullet in his paintings, circling round looking for their destiny, was to compare them to what ŋäpaki’ do when they go onto the genealogy website Ancestry.com. This might seem strange to non-Indigenous readers, who see heritage and destiny as opposite ends of a trajectory from past to present to future. But in the swirling waters of Gurka’wuy, Wukuṉ points to a very different spiral of existence. As his spirit returns to these waters, it joins a family of mullets, circling round the great rock Bumurruŋu. These are not merely fish, they are Djuwany, the entire reservoir of spirits for the Marrakulu clan. “The spirit,’ he said, ‘travels through the water and returns to its source and then is born anew."

According to Marrakulu lore, these fish became the Marparrarr ancestral beings who were the original inhabitants of the lands around Gurka’wuy. The bubbles that rise to the surface from beneath the rock Bamurruŋu are seen as the life force of these ancestral beings, revealing their direct ancestral connection to the Marrakulu clan.

– Henry Skerritt