Riji pearl shells

Posted: 15 Sep 2011  |  By: Apolline Kohen

The word riji is from the Bardi language and are the pearl shells traditionally worn by Aboriginal men in the north-west part of Australia, around present-day Broome. Objects of great beauty and value, pearl shells were traditionally traded with inland Aboriginal groups. They have been found at Yuendumu in the desert, South-Eastern Arnhem Land, Queensland and South Australia.

The further they travelled from the coastline into the central deserts, the more valuable and prized they grew. Often plain pearl shells were decorated further along trade routes, far from their place of origin. They were often incised with geometric patterns or figurative scenes highlighted with a mixture of red or yellow ochre and resin rubbed into the grooves. Decorated and plain pearl shells were used for rain-making and magical purposes, for trade, in ceremonies and as personal adornments such as necklaces or pubic covers when they were worn attached by belts or necklaces of hair string. Although in many areas pearl shell was used in male initiation ceremonies, men, women and children in the Kimberley also wore it on festive or formal occasions. Women also played a key role in moving shells along the extensive traditional trade routes that still exist in remote areas today. For the Bardi people, an important quality inherent in pearl shell is its shimmering iridescence. Riji are associated with water, spiritual powers and healing due to the luminous quality of their surfaces.

This somewhat equates with the ‘shimmers’ of pigments. The Bardi people perceive the Rainbow Serpent to be the creator of pearl shell. Through its manifestation as a rainbow, pearl shell is also associated to rain in the Broome area. One of the unique designs used in the Kimberley is a pattern of interlocking designs. Many variations around this theme can be found in early collections held in public and private collections. The pearl shells incised with figurative motifs are often naturalistic scenes of the pearling and cattle industries. These are important and fascinating early records of Aboriginal experiences in these industries and of life after Western contact. Anthropologist Kim Akerman has documented many of the early twentieth-century pearl shell collections held in Australian museum collections. His book Riji and Jakoki: Kimberley pearl shell in Aboriginal Australia remains the most comprehensive book written on the art and significance of the pearl shells of the Kimberley region. Pearl shells have fascinated collectors and art lovers for decades because of their beauty as art objects.

Interestingly, in recent years, a master pearl shell artist, Aubrey Tigan, has emerged on the Aboriginal contemporary art scene and is now having regular exhibitions around the country. In 2005, Broome gallery director Emily Rohr from Short Street Gallery entered a set of Tigan’s pearl shells in the prestigious Telstra Art Awards. These exquisite works captured the attention of the public and art critics. A year later, Tigan held his first solo show at William Mora Galleries in Melbourne. Since then, Tigan’s work has entered in many prominent public and private collections. Tigan started to make riji well before Rohr started to actively and successfully promote his work. Tigan, a law man from the Bardi and Djawi people, was born in 1945 and started carving pearl shells after he was initiated in the 1960s. He lives on the peninsula north of Broome with his family. He has trained as a jeweller and is proficient in the making of all types of traditional artefacts belonging to the Bardi and Jawu people. His uncle was instrumental in his training. Tigan carves and decorates his shells with intricate geometrical motifs highlighted with red ochre pigments. He finds his inspirations in traditional old designs, particularly in the use of key patterns. Each work is unique and carefully carved. Tigan, as a law and traditional man, follows the footsteps of his ancestors and, as a great contemporary artist, has the ability to make infinite subtle variations on the powerful Bardi and Djawi traditional geometrical patterns.

Tigan is busy with plans for exhibitions and more artistic experimentations. Through Short Street Gallery, later this year he will have his first show overseas at the High Commission in Singapore. He has also been approached to make a suite of prints. If this project goes ahead, it will be interesting to see how Tigan transposes and transforms the incised motifs he does on pearl shells onto etched copper plates.

Images from top:

Riji, ochre carving on pearlshell, 2010, 17.5 x 14.5cm. Image courtesy Short St Gallery, Broome, Western Australia.

Riji, ochre carving on pearlshell, 2010, 17 x 14.5cm. Image courtesy Short St Gallery, Broome, Western Australia.

Love Riji, ochre carving on pearlshell, 2010, 18 x 13.5cm. Image courtesy Short St Gallery, Broome, Western Australia.