Artist's Details

Hockey Art is an initiative of Hockey Queensland, run in conjunction with its North Queensland Remote & Indigenous Hockey Program. It aims to encourage community involvement and offer opportunity to expand horizons of thought, selfawareness and self-development through HockeyArt, Education and Player Development.

By combining sport, culture and art it is hoped that young people in Cape York Peninsula and the Gulf of Carpentaria Indigenous communities will feel more at ease and at home when they take part in Hockey Queensland talent development clinics.

The project is an example of two often mutually exclusive industries – the arts and sport – coming together for the benefit of the community members.

All sticks in this collection were painted by students at the Tropical North Queensland TAFE in Cairns which is a partner with Hockey Queensland in this project.

Yvonne Anderson
Gungarra Clan Western Queensland

I have always loved the natural environment. Growing up in the bush taught me to appreciate and respect nature. When I moved to coastal areas, I found the different colours and patterns in our diverse creation to have a positive influence upon me. This motivated me to be creative.

Through my artwork, I hope to give the viewer a sense of the beauty that is all around us. Many of my paintings relate to the sea and its many abstract forms of life. I paint mainly in acrylics and use a lot of glazes to heighten the intensity of colour. The inspiration for this picture comes from the diverse colours and patterns that abound in the marine environment of the Barrier Reef.

Rosie Barkus

The hockey stick reflects some Torres Strait cultural designs of a Headdress, Island Drum and Dancing Shakers. The headdress is worn, the drum is beating and the hand shakers are in rhythm when dancing. The Pearl Shell, Pearling Lugger and Pearl Divers Helmet will never be forgotten as once being the main industry which brought many people from all over the world to the Torres Strait. Some of their descendants are still living up there. The turtle, dugong, octopus, squid and fish are some of the seafoods the islanders eat and when cooked various ways are very delicious.

Paul Bong
Indinji Clan

The story of this painting on the hockey stick and the ball is a story about Behanna Creek near Gordonvale in Far North Queensland. My father used to take his family fishing and camping at this creek. Dada and I used to go fishing while my mother, brother and sister used to stay back at the camp. They would stay back to light the fire and prepare a meal for when we get back from fishing. They would dig wild yam, make damper and put the rice on for the fish we caught. The design and images are of the rainforest area: grub, fish, people, spirit man, rainforest.

Kevin Edmondstone

The colours on the stick and ball are the land where I come from in Yarrabah and they mean land and sea.

Nicholas Ganaia

My name is Nicholas Ganaia and I am from Boigu Island in the northern Torres Strait. As you can see the painting on the stick and ball is on both sides, one side is the Islands of the Torres Strait and the other side is the gear for dancing, fighting and ceremony.

Kalee Igibe

I am a Torres Strait Islander. The painting on my hockey stick is symbolic. The octopus represents my mother’s birthplace which is Murray Island. The tentacles are the eight tribes. My mother’s tribe is called "the komet". Her totem is the wanipun (gecko). On special occasions she would put a kokwam (hibiscus) in her hair to celebrate.

My mother has passed on. Her memories are still with me. I can still hear the sound of her voice telling us stories of her home so far away. One of the stories was about the sacred drum "wasikor". Malu and Bomai were warriors. They were called Zogole (Holy Men). Only the sacred men knew the secret code. These holy men had considerable powers. Ceremonies included sacred dances and sacred chants performed to the beat of the two famous "Drums of Mer" one of which can still be seen today on Murray Island.

Russell Karklis

My name is Russell Karklis. I am from North Stradbroke Island. This lizard is about me when I go looking for tucker around the Island. The dots are when I go walkabout around the island and the circle dots are camping areas. The handprints represent the Land.

Katherine Kynuna

Yirrganydji
Our traditional country which runs from Cairns to Port Douglas. The drawings and paintings on the hockey stick, and the ball are part of our traditional country. This is telling the stories of our ancestors, where they lived and walked, they travelled by canoes to go from one place to another, to hunt and gather food to feed their families to survive. They also travelled in canoes to trade with other neighbouring tribes, and for ceremonial dances.

Joey Josia Laifoo

The dugong an the turtle represent the main food source for the Torres Strait Islanders. The blue green and white are the colours of the Torres Strait Flag. Between the turtle and the dugong there are 3 faces that represent the Torres Strait people. The fi shes at the top of the stick represent that the Torres Strait Islander people rely on the sea for their main food source. All of the designs are traditional designs.

The red, yellow and black represent the aboriginal colours. The goanna at the bottom represents one of their main food source, as well as echidna. The ants at the top shows that the aboriginal people mainly live off the land. The six white stingrays on the side of the stick represents the two cultures uniting. The colours on the ball represent the two cultures uniting, also the two stingrays are another food source and also totem (God) for both cultures.

John Mast

The stick is about both cultures, the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islands culture. It shows the food chain and totems of both cultures. I have painted the Kangaroo, Snake, Goanna, Emu and the Echidna for the Aboriginal culture. I have also painted the Shark, Trevally,
Dugong, Turtle and Crocodile for the Torres Strait Islands culture. The two cultures are interlinked through my stick.

Linda Myers

I am from the Aranda People of the Red Centre, Alice Springs. My artwork is inspired by my family and my home land, Alice Springs. The colours I use in my artwork are the natural colours of the earth
from the McDonald Ranges, red, yellow, white and black. These colours are used by my people in ceremonies, as body paints and for painting.

On the hockey stick I have painted the Inape (Echidna). It is a marsupial animal found all over Australia. To the Indigenous people it is a symbol/ design in their artwork, a dreamtime story and a totem. The Inape is an unusual animal, it is small, spiky and eats ants. In danger it rolls in to a ball and burrows itself in the ground with its spikes sticking out so that it can protect itself.

Jacob Pilot

My stick represents the story of Gelam who left his mother Usar on Moa Island in the shape of a dugong. The paintings on my stick show his long journey away from his mother that took him to Mer Island.

Deanne Rioli

My name is Deanne Rioli and my family originates from Melville Island in the Northern Territory. I have chosen to base my design on the spear because it has a variety of meanings and purposes and is of great cultural importance to me and my people.

• Hunting: we use spears to hunt our food
  
• Warfare: To fi ght against other mainland tribes
  
• Protection: To defend us from white settlers or slave traders
  
• Marriage: It served a ritual purpose that sealed the marriage between a young girl and her promised husband.
  
• Communication: When a child was born, whatever sex it was determined the length of the spear that was made and placed outside the hut by the father. A long spear indicated a boy and if it was short, onlookers knew the newborn child was a girl.
  
• Social Status: The greater amount of spears a man had, the higher in social status he usually was. This usually occurred in elderly men.
• Culture: The spear is of great cultural signifi cance and is used by my people in myths and legends, dance and ceremonies.

Ceferino Sabatino

At Waineb there was a Zogo place for Tabu (Snake). If a snake was killed its head was brought to this place. Beside a small shrub is the Zogo Stone.

This stone has the features of a snake’s head. By people adhering to the custom of bringing all the snakes heads here, the island could remain safe from the tides and wind. When people stopped this custom the island began to be washed away. The people then had to build a rock wall along the shore front to help stop erosion.

Story told by: Jerry Stephen Snr
(UGAR) Stephen Island

Leroy Savage

My name is Leroy Savage. I come from Kubin which is on Moa Island. The painting on my hockey stick represents traditional fighting shield called Baidamal Baba used by one of our great warriors, "Wobin". The star shark is the Southern Cross it is in the north and it tells the weather.

Cynthia Vogler

The inspiration behind the creation of artwork on this hockey stick and ball comes from a visit I had to the rock art galleries in the Laura region of Far North Queensland. As an indigenous textile artist I chose the medium of batik. The dying and waxing of fabric to use on the hockey stick and ball. The rock art sites we visited around Laura were of a very spiritual nature and you could feel the presence of our ancestors and ancestoral spirits were close by watching us. I was very intrigued by the way of life back then and the belief systems held by the traditional people.

The red fabric on the hockey stick represents the land, and the spiritual connection we have to the land as Indigenous people. The small hands represent rock art, one of the earliest forms of art work in the world and the circle designs  represent the people coming together for special ceremonies and gatherings for the well being and continual survival of the group. Traditional life back then was one of caring and sharing. The visits to the rock art sites have been a great inspiration and infl uence in some of the artwork I have created over the years.

Matatia Andrew Warrior

The artwork on the hockey stick is based on the traditional artefacts and food and are still hunted and caught in the traditional manner. The dugong is probably the most prized of all but is also my totem which has been handed down through my family for generations. Turtle is another favourite also caught in the same manner by way of
harpooning and the crayfish is a major export supporting our economy. Squid, when plentiful and in season become the centre of competition and the four fish represent a variety eaten from the deep, shallow, reef and mangroves.

The artefacts depicted are worn in ceremony, initiation, dance and in war. They consist of the bow & arrow, stone-headed club, two traditional headdresses - Dthoeri/Dari and Sam and drum. The star is derived from our flag symbolising the 5 groups of islands and unity in the Torres Strait. The ball depicts the Dthoeri (headdress) and star of unity from our flag.

Dorothy Webster (Congoo)
Mbabaram Tribe Far North Qld

I grew up in an old timber house on the bank of a sandy creek, which served as a playground for my fi ve siblings and me.I chose these traditional colours, as they are exactly the same as the clay we painted our bodies with in the steep little gully, which ran off the sandy creek.

• Sandy Creek – dots
• Safety play area boundary - stripes enclosed in black line
• Flowers – wild flowers on the creek bank
• Butterfly – depicting the shortness of our childhood years like that of the butterfly’s life span.