Jumaadi, Sea of thorny fruit, 2020. Acrylic on cloth, unframed 310 x 280cm. Commissioned by Blacktown Arts, for the Terra inFirma program 2020, curated by Paul Howard. Courtesy: the artist and King Street Gallery, Sydney.

“Jumaadi paints in a range of mediums including paper, cloth, wood, hide and metal on both new and repurposed materials. Collecting this material is akin to the collection of the other material he needs for his painting, like stories, ideas, world views, physical and spiritual experiences. The work in this exhibition features four key mediums: cloth, buffalo hide, metal and paper. With the exception of paper, preparing both the medium and the painting is delicate and laborious, ranging from handling the skin of newly slaughtered buffalo or cow to treating the surface of the cloth with rice starch and folding and refolding the sharp edges of metal sheets.

These are the vessels onto which Jumaadi paints his trees, rain, little houses, love, longing and displacement. All of this requires various forms of engagement with different communities which he has developed over the past 20 years.” – Dr Siobhan Campbell

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