The Art of Healing gift range

Bush medicine and knowledge have been connected to what is known as ‘cool burns’ in many parts of traditional Aboriginal homelands, usually practised during the autumn months. Low-intensity fire was and is done to manage and maintain plant, tree and grass growth. It regenerates and brings into being new growth, buds and shoots, continuing the cultural process of gathering food and medical resources. This process was part of a vast knowledge that is held between the sky, land, people and wildlife, all connected within lore and story to people and land. Cool burns were also practised to clear built-up areas of bushland, so that hunting and gathering would be easier, and foods and bush medicines more clearly recognised in the environment.

The triptych depicts traditional times of Yorta Yorta women and girls collecting bush foods and remedies, with their dilly-bags hung from their shoulders—after cool burning occurs. The figures stand in honour of ancestral knowledge along the bank of dhungala (the Murray River), which is symbolised by the hands of ancestors holding billabong sediment. This also contains the symbolism of healing, along with the continued benefits of medicinal knowledge, hand in hand with spirituality in more than 2000 generations of people on Country. The oval shapes in the foreground are coolamons; inside them are seeds, pods and reeds that have been gathered before the cool burning took place. The coolamons have been painted with local river-bark ink. Its use is vastly versatile, as the bark ink is also used in the creation of medicine in Yorta Yorta Country.