Lila has painted an incredibly rare, large and oversized nioge blanket. The complex and astonishing array of traditional designs she has painted on the blanket were taught to her by one of her mothers’ (her aunt), Joyce-Bella Mujorumo, former Duvahe (Chief) of Dahorurajé clan women.

The border and the irregular square frames are known as orriseegé or ‘pathways’ and provide a compositional framework for the designs. The or’e (path) designs originate from the time of the ancestors and relate to the intricate footpaths that run through food gardens and garden plots. The first mud-dyed barkcloths were simple, repetitive bands of simple vertical lines (either in appliqued mud-dyed barkcloth or painted with dark earth pigments likely to also be river ‘mud’) or representing these pathways through the garden of and are a design that may only be worn by maganahe duvahe (female Chiefs).

The main repeated arch design is amami sor’e, a design painted by the Ömie ancestors. This particular design is thought to be related to the ceremonial turtle shell and seashell necklaces the Ömie created. The precious turtle shell fragments are referred to as ‘worro worrë in’e in’e’. Turtle shell and seashell were foreign, rare and beautiful materials from the faraway coast so it was highly valued in the Ömie mountains and would be displayed as a form of wealth on necklaces. This was the primary form of traditional currency of the Ömie. The shells were so highly valued they also became an important barkcloth design painted onto nioge. Ömie ancestors would travel to find turtle shells and seashells on the coast. The people living on the coast would hunt and kill the turtles but would leave the turtle shells on the beach. The Ömie would search for them and carry the turtle shell in one whole piece back up to the Ömie mountains. On a large scale this design creates a dazzling, hynotic visual effect.

The vertical lines of diamonds are the men’s tattoo design of the bellybutton, vinohu’e, representing siha’u’e, the fruit of the sihe tree. It is an importrant body design tattoed during the Ujawé initiation rite which were performed in underground chambers, known as guai, hidden in the forest. Lila explains how in the time of the ancestors during times of tribal warfare, the Ömie male warriors had no food while they were defending their borders in the forest far from their villages so they survived by chewing the sihe fruit, swallowing the juice and then they would spit out the pulp.

The triangles infilled with black pigment within the orriseegé frames are the Dahorurajé clan design, mahuva’oje, the hoof-prints of a cheeky and mischievous pig that has wreaked havoc on a garden during the night. The orriseegé is infilled with sabu deje, a design representing the spots which can be seen on the sides of a wood-boring grub. This grub is sacred to Ömie people as it plays an important part within the creation story of how Huvaimo (Mount Lamington) came to be volcanic. It is a traditional sor’e (tattoo design) which was most commonly tattooed running in one line under both eyes.