Ilma is an all-embracing term covering Bardi ceremonies and the objects used in them. Though today these items are made from brightly coloured commercial wool, their construction derives from ancestral thread-cross artefacts that their makers wove from hair or animal fur. Roy Wiggan’s ilma are used in ceremonies where dancers present and then conceal the objects, rotating them face down, or longitudinally at right angles, to those witnessing the performances.

The abstract patterns on ilma embody features associated with the sea such as tidal rips, waterspouts and storm clouds. In this group, Wiggan has commemorated the three-day ocean-faring ordeal that his father faced and survived after being washed out to sea on a broken raft. Wiggan learned of this event through visitations from his father’s rai (spirit).