Woretemoeteryenner – Palawa Woman of Lutruwita
This series of black and white paintings is an interpretation of the incredible life of Woretemoeteryenner, ancestral grandmother of Louise Daniels. Born prior to the British colonisation of Lutruwita, Woretemoeteryenner’s childhood was irrevocably disrupted by the arrival of the sealers and whalers who plundered Bass Strait. Her father was the chief, Mannalargenna, who arranged for her to “marry” a young English sealer named George Briggs. She worked as a sealing woman on the Bass Strait islands and bore five children to George before he abandoned her.
Woretemoeteryenner later survived a sealing trip which went disastrously off course to Mauritius, only to be detained at the Aboriginal settlement at Wybalenna soon after her return from overseas.
After eleven years at Wybalenna, Woretemoeteryenner was released into the care of her daughter, Dalrymple “Dolly” Briggs Johnson, who lived in Perth Tasmania, then Dunorlan, where Woretemoeteryenner died. These years with her family were among the happiest in her arduous life.
