Eileen Tep

Eileen Tep works at the Girringun Arts Centre, a small town 200km south of Cairns in Queensland.

It was not until 2009 that the Girringun artists revealed their work to the Australian public, at the Cairns Indigenous Art Fair, where they were a great success with both critics and collectors.

The Bagu were originally fire boards. These objects had a sacred value because of the torrential rains that regularly fall in this tropical region. They were transported as they traveled by this nomadic people. Women were not allowed to handle them, only a man designated by the group had exclusive charge of the fire and had to ensure that it never went out.