Jack Karadada belongs to the family of Wanjina painters, whose total outcome must far exceed those of any other school of wanjina painters. Jack, his wife Lily '(Mindildil), and his brother Lewis and Lewis' wife Rosie (Ngalirrman) are members of the Wunambal speaking peoples that occupied the NorthWest Kimberley between the prince regent river and the king edward river. Their late brother manila karadada (kutwit) had been one of the foremost painters of wanjina pictures during the renaissence of North Kimberley Art that occurred in the mid-1970s. While Artists such as manilla and alex minjilManganu produced work geared at the upper end of the market, the jack and his immediate family generally produced artefacts and smaller works painted or engraved on prepared slabs of wood or slate. The small carved plaques were to be a major addition to their already extensive range of creations directed at a less affluent end of the market. As an occasional break from this production line approach all members painted larger pictures on bark and later canvas. While smaller bark painting are usually done on an unstretched piece of bark larger ones, such as this example are hemmed with an applied length of supplejack vine that is neatly 'sewn' to the margin of the of the bark. The rounded apex of the top of the bark creates an interesting medieval air - a gothic window through which we see the dreaming - and are in turn observed from the other side. Jack's wanjina figures can be usually be distinguished from those of other Artists by several features including the eyes that usually abut each other, separated only by a nose that is reduced to a stroke of the brush. The internally divided haloes are also usually totally bounded, unlike the free-ended rays seen on other wanjina. This painting, one of the few larger examples of jack's work to come on to the market, clearly shows that his better work ranks with those of other Wanjina masters.

Kim Akerman