Fiona Jin-majinggai Mason paints for Maningrida Arts.

About Maningrida Arts:

The coastal town of Maningrida has a population of 2600 and lies on the estuary of the Liverpool River, located approximately 400 km east of Darwin in North East Arnhem Land.
The Kunibídji people are the traditional landowners of this country in central Arnhem Land. The name Maningrida is an Anglicised version of the Kunibídji name Manayingkarírra, which comes from the phrase ‘Mane djang karirra’, meaning ‘the place where the dreaming changed shape’.

This place, the creek and water, we love this country, we Aboriginal people. We love it. The old people were the same, attached to the water and this land. The old people, our grandfathers and grandmothers, great grandparents, our ancestors, they lived here in this place, put here for them. Ivan Namirrkki, Kuninjku artist, 2003

The Kuninjku homelands are situated in western Arnhem Land, in the far north of Australia. Sandstone escarpments crown dense, tropical eucalypt forests and grasslands, which open up on to the vast seasonal floodplains of the Tomkinson, Liverpool and Mann Rivers. The Kuninjku are neighboured in the north by Kunbarlang and Ndjébbana people, to the east by Gun-nartpa and Gurrgoni, to the south by Dalabon and Kune people and to the west by the culturally affiliated, yet distinct, Kunwinkju people. These language groups are part of the complex social network within western Arnhem Land, and have strong kin, ceremonial and artistic relationships.