This painting was purchased by the Koorie Heritage Trust in 1983 from an Auction house in Melbourne. This work is untitled but the theme is consistent with many of Barak’s other works in that it depicts ceremony.

During his last two decades Barak painted the ceremonial side of Wurundjeri culture - in particular, corroborees. In Barak’s day these ceremonial meetings were held almost nightly around Melbourne. A corroboree typically involved elements of dance, song, ritual and discussion, and could be called for a number of reasons: marriage, initiation, trade or dispute settlement.

Barak’s paintings and drawings had a strong linear emphasis. He depicted Wurundjeri people wearing traditional possum skin cloaks, clapping boomerangs together, and performing dances and hunting ceremonies. Animal totems – emus, echidnas, turtles – also figured.

Art offered Barak a chance to record the traditional ways of his culture, and pass this knowledge down. When Governor Sir Henry Loch’s request to witness a corroboree was refused by the Board for the Protection of Aborigines, which had banned such “heathen” practices, Barak was commissioned to paint the Governor a picture of a corroboree instead.

This painting, by William Barak (Berac), is believed to feature one of the ceremonies of his clan - the Woiwurung. As well as a painter, Barak (Berac) was Ngurungaeta, a clan leader.

This painting features a ceremony which depicts hunting, with wallaby and emu. William Barak was ngurunggaeta (a clan leader) of the Woiwurung (Wurundjeri).

Over his lifetime William Barak gained a reputation as a skilled artist, creating paintings, drawings and artefacts.

In 2006, the Koorie Heritage Trust took our Barak painting to the Centre for Cultural Materials Conservation at the University of Melbourne to be treated.

As part of this process the Conservators undertook infra-red examination and uncovered a map underneath Barak’s painting, showing that Barak was using second hand paper for his paintings.

This wooden shield (and a wooden club) made by William Barak, was purchased by the Koorie Heritage Trust in 1991 from a private collector.

The collector had purchased both artefacts from a shop called 'Decoration’ in Little Collins Sreet many years prior. The words 'Made by King Barak Last of the Yarra Tribe 18/12/97' are inscribed on the shield in cursive script with black ink.