Aboriginal Artist - Philip Gudthaykudthay

Personal totems are native cat, hollow log, olive python, water goanna. Wagilak association. Gudthaykudthay paints a tract of countryside called Gunyungmirringa, which is flat eucalyptus forested land nearly forty miles east of Ramingining and about ten miles inland from Hutchinson Strait, between Howard Island and the mainland. Here, the original Badurru [hollow log] ceremony was performed. Two beings in the form of native cats attacked their husband, who assumed the form of a glider possum after being burnt in the domestic dispute. Gathering his tribesmen, he came back and speared them to death. Their spirits left their bodies and took the form of fresh water fish in a nearby stream. However they were caught in a fish trap and eaten by their husband's tribesmen. Their brother, the Crow man Wak, gathered their bones and put them in a hollow log and performed the Badurru ceremony so that their souls could find peace. Early the next morning, at the climax of the ceremony the crow and his tribesmen took the coffin up into the sky where the bones dropped out and scattered across the heavens forming the Milky Way. The black void beside the Milky Way is where the log entered the heavens. Gudthaykudthay is called 'Pussy Cat' after the native cats in this drama. This ceremony is performed as a post-death ritual by present day Yolngu (Aborigines) to finally put their deceased souls to rest. After death the body is left to decompose, and then some time later the bones are collected, cleaned, painted, and placed inside a specially cut and decorated hollow log called Badurru amidst singing and dancing. The log is then brought out into the main camp and placed upright before final songs and dances are performed. It is then left. All these beings are sung, the native cats, the possum, the fish, the crow, fresh water and the hollow log. The hollow log itself is thought to be a spiritual entity in its own right. The circle painted is a hole cut near the top which represents its eye. This spirit not only resides in the sky, but is also embedded in the earth at this place.