Tjungutja – Art of the Spinifex Collaborative by ReDot Fine Art Gallery

REDOT FINE ART GALLERY in collaboration with Spinifex Arts Project presents

Tjungutja Art of the Spinifex Collaborative A Collection of Fine Spinifex Indigenous Art

27 th April - 28 th May 2016

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Tjungutja – Art of the Spinifex Collaborative The ReDot Fine Art Gallery is extremely honoured to be hosting its second doubleheader exhibition of a strong 2016 exhibition calendar. We are proud to present the first ever solo show for Lawrence Pennington, a senior lawman born circa 1934 and a series of 8 collaborative works by the latest sensation that is sweeping the modern Indigenous art movement, the Spinifex Arts Project. Tjungutja – Art of the Spinifex Collaborative and Wati Wara – Lawrence Pennington Solo are the culmination of over two years’ worth of curating and significant cultural discussion, to ensure that these two firsts for the small community in the southern part of the Great Victoria Desert, receive maximum attention and kudos. Never before have 8 major collaborative works from the Spinifex Arts Project been gathered in one commercial gallery setting, until today. And indeed, the works that will be on display in Singapore have already - even before their commercial debut - been exhibited in a major museum offering, in the much praised and critically-acclaimed Tarnanthi exhibition in late 2015 at the Art Gallery of South Australia (AGSA), curated by Nici Cumpston. Equally important are the 29 individual jewels amassed for this opening of Mr. Pennington’s first solo show, celebrating the life of one of the most revered Indigenous men in Australia today. Born just outside of the north-eastern boundary of Spinifex at a place called Urlu, Lawrence came in as a young Wati (initiated man). He married late in Cundeelee and has only one son. Lawrence painted in the early years, collaboratively

and individually before leaving Tjuntjuntjara for about 7 years. Perhaps it was because he had aged somewhat or because he was back on country amongst his fellow senior lawmen and therefore in a more contemplative space. Whatever the reason that led Lawrence to recently begin painting again with vigour, it has produced a portfolio of fascinating, eclectic works which are distinctly his. His paintings have unearthed a treasure trove of culture and simplistic beauty using minimal colour palates and a honed sense of positive-negative space, drawing the viewer into a world which has long since been forgotten and the prerogative of a time passed. The exhibitions begin on Wednesday 27th April and runs until Saturday 28th May 2016. The opening night will be attended in person by Winmati Roberts, Lawrence Penningtonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s nephew, and Fred Grant, on behalf of the Spinifex Arts Project. Art Centre coordinators Amanda Dent and Brian Hallet will also be in attendance, in what will be their second trip to Singapore following on from their acclaimed international debut in 2014. A must-see show for anyone interested in following the recent developments in Indigenous Art and an opportunity to meet a beautiful and talented proponent of one of the worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s oldest art forms.

Giorgio Pilla Director ReDot Fine Art Gallery

Spinifex Country Source: ÂŠ Photo Courtesy of Stephen Oxenbury 2014

Spinifex Artists as Cold War Moderns In October 1986, a desert-dwelling family of a community known as the Anagu tjuta pila nguru, or “people from the land of the spinifex” became the last Aboriginals in Australia to abandon traditional nomadic life. A male elder who had escaped from the Warburton mission with his young wife and stepdaughter twenty-ﬁve years earlier headed the family of seven. Returning to the red-earth landscape of spinifex grass and mulga, they raised their children, remaining in the wilderness as family and friends departed for mission life. The family walked from rock hole to rock hole spearing kangaroo, emu, goanna, blue-tongued lizard and mallee hen: the last of ﬁve hundred generations to pursue this nomadic way of life across a stretch of remote country now stripped of all other residents. Seeing the glint and streaks of aircraft in desert sky, they threw magical objects at them and sang protective songs. White people were ghosts traveling above them and across the land. The couple told their children that distant trains were roaring Wati Wanampi, venomous water-snake beings. From a hill overlooking the Blackstone mission settlement (today, Papulankutja) the children witnessed what they believed was a pitched battle between legendary warmala or warriors. The frightening vista was of an amateur football skirmish. It would be the family’s closest brush with the outside world until 1986.

Exiles living at the Coonana settlement for those displaced by the Maralinga nuclear tests of the 1950s believed their lost desert relatives dead. Stories about the family’s survival continued to circulate, however. In 1986, when a group from Coonana made a ceremonial visit to a remote desert site, they discovered fresh footprints. After following the trail for two days, they sighted a family carrying wooden spears and painted with ochre in preparation for ritual. Reunited with kin, the husband and wife recognized relatives among the searchers. The male elder wept quietly upon hearing news of people he had not seen in decades. Relocated to mission settlements, the family of former nomads generated news reports about “the lost people” and “the last desert tribe.” The Sydney Morning Herald reported: “the three sons, the younger woman and her little boy had never seen the modern world before.” Newspaper readers remained blissfully ignorant of a facet of modernity to which the “last huntergatherers on earth,” had been, quite literally, exposed. A thundering shudder the family elder had felt in the wilderness was that of a nuclear weapons test. At the 1984 Royal Commission into British Nuclear Tests in Australia, Lawrence Pennington’s wife, Myrtle, testiﬁed that she also had heard explosions, felt the earth tremble, and seen clouds that had “destroyed” sacred sites. The Royal Commission established that authorities had accepted that indigenous people were traversing the western edge of the prohibited area, making Spinifex people part of an avant-garde. As human subjects in experiments in nuclear technology that dispersed radioactivity and displaced Spinifex people from their homelands, these custodians of an ancient culture had become, simultaneously, cold war moderns. What follows is a narrative of events that entangle Western history with that of the Spinifex people. It is knowledge that transforms our perception of works of art that have been entrusted to our care and which serve as a memento mori of the cold war era.

Terra Nullius for the Atomic Age A ﬁnal episode in the dispossession of Australia’s ﬁrst inhabitants unfolded halfway around the world during the late-1940s. With cold war hostilities escalating in Europe, the British government no longer considered economic failure the nation’s primary threat, but rather a potential war with the communist East. Rearmament became a priority, and the atomic bomb its weapon of choice. Atomic proving grounds in Nevada, with their access to US nuclear know-how, were the logical site for a British bomb test.

Left page: Aerial View of Tjuntjuntjara Source: © Photo Courtesy of Spinifex Arts Project and Louise Allerton

However, information sharing on weapons development had ended along with World War II. Australia, which had signed a 1946 agreement for the cooperative development of a rocket testing range, would serve as the ground zero of last resort. When British military authorities arrived in Australia to conduct their first test blast in the Monte Bello Islands, eight kilometers off the northwest coast, the only information source they had consulted about the Aboriginal population was the Encylopaedia Britannica. Responsibility for insuring the safety of natives, indigenous and otherwise, fell to Australian officials. The scope of their task expanded enormously when Prime Minister Menzies authorized atomic testing within the Woomera Range. Two issues – nuclear ambition and public relations anxiety – would dominate Australian policies affecting Spinifex people for the next decade. To patrol a 100,000 square kilometer area, the Weapons Research Establishment (WRE) at Woomera employed two men: Walter MacDougall, who had worked at missions in the Kimberley and central Australia, and Robert Macaulay, an anthropologist. It was a hopeless task, given its gargantuan scope and laughable resources. To clear desert lands of natives, MacDougall manipulated myths regarding venomous wanampi serpents and the evil spirits called mamu. He informed nomads that atomic bombs had released a deadly mamu poison across the Woomera landscape. Told by officials and their indigenous guides that the land had been “poisoned” by nuclear testing, Spinifex people left their homelands for mission life in ever-greater numbers. Those who remained felt increasingly isolated and insecure in the desert, having lost the youths needed to parent new generations and the elders whose sacred knowledge provided protection in a landscape teeming with spiritual forces. The indigenous diaspora from lands that “the bomb finished,” accelerated what one anthropologist has called the “process of lifestyle disintegration” triggered by contact with Euro-Australian society generations earlier.

Homeward Bound For Spinifex people consigned to missions, nomadic mobility took new forms. Cundeelee mission, a government ration depot and the repository for many of those removed from Spinifex homelands, inadvertently preserved indigenous culture due to a meager level of subsidy. Insufﬁcient food rations compelled residents to maintain their hunting and foraging skills. Reliance on ﬁrewood for fuel compelled nomadic residency patterns as resources at a given site became exhausted. After a stinging federal indictment of the settlement facilities, in the mid-1970s the Australian Evangelical Mission withdrew. Residents were relocated to Coonana, a former pastoral station situated in a landscape completely alien to the community it served.

The multiple relocations of Spinifex exiles occurred as other ﬁrst Australians were mobilizing to reclaim their heritage and homelands. During the 1970s, thousands of Aboriginals, encouraged by new government policies of self-determination, abandoned government settlements to return “back to country” in an epoch-deﬁning outstation movement. For Spinifex people, a return to ancestral lands had life-or-death implications. With a compensation award from the Royal Commission into British Nuclear Tests in Australia, the Spinifex community built their road back home. Elder Simon Hogan trekked three hundred kilometers to the northern margin of Spinifex country, blazing a path from rock hole to rock hole as his son followed behind driving a road grader. The new route permitted access to Tjuntjuntjara, bringing the Spinifex people’s “long days,” as they call their recent history, full circle. Life there soon conformed to seasonal rhythms, with sojourns for ceremonial ‘business,’ and crosscountry travel to hunt, harvest medicinal plants and collect the ochre, feathers and stones used in ceremonies. Elders not only led their people back to their spiritual homelands, but also assumed the functions of a political and artistic avant-garde. In 1992, a landmark decision

by the Australian High Court overturned the legal doctrine of terra nullius. Within a year, Spinifex people launched their homeland claim. In 1997, with their native title application underway, community members born in Spinifex Country began painting to document their territorial custodianship. Discussions of Tjukurpa (â&#x20AC;&#x153;Dreamingsâ&#x20AC;?) preoccupied the new artists as they worked through the day and into the night. The resulting works, crafted explicitly for the public disclosure of the birthrights associated with sacred places, had no historical precedent for Spinifex people or their culture. Two heroically scaled collaborative paintings were unveiled at the signing of a native title agreement in July 1998 at Miramiratjara in a remote northeastern corner of Spinifex country. A market for Spinifex works emerged between 1999 and 2000 when a traveling exhibition featuring the native title paintings toured Australian cities. Spinifex works feature a vivid iconography depicting the footprints, pathways, and animal silhouettes of Tjukurpa that have been purged from the artistic output of other Aboriginal art collectives. Today, Toyota Land Cruisers return the artists to country for plein air painting camps where a group of senior women might stake out a spot on a sand dune

at a salt lake to sing and paint its Dreaming into life. The vital bond with country and its expression in art has endured the ﬂuctuations of political regimes and art markets because it is nothing less than the lived truth of Spinifex people. Its most eloquent spokesman still remains the last Spinifex elder to abandon nomadic life. In 1987 he explained the relationship to the land and its sacred law to a reporter. “It was good out there. Good country.I looked after my country.” Without its people, the land had been left “an orphan,” roaming and lost “without parents to go to.” With resettlement at Tjuntjuntjara and the resumption of custodial rituals, the land had recovered its caretakers, and the caretakers their life-world. A newspaper account of the elder’s ﬁrst visit to his homeland after abandoning nomadic life conveys the ecstacy of reunion with country for one of its custodians: “He galloped up the sandhills with ease and began to exude a happiness that his people had never seen before.”

8 March 2016 About the Author Greg Castillo, an architectural and design historian, is an Associate Professor at the College of Environmental Design at the University of California, Berkley, and a Research Associate at the United States Studies Centre at the University of Sydney, Australia. His work has focused on design politics in the early cold war era and the counterculture moment of the late ‘60s and early ‘70s. He has delivered public lectures at the New York Museum of Modern Art, London’s Victoria and Albert Museum, the National Gallery of Denmark and universities internationally. The author owes a debt of gratitude to Ian Baird, Amanda Dent, Robyn and Mattias Kelch, Fred Myers, Terry Smith, and Henry Skerritt for their comments and corrections. An extended version of this essay appeared in Contemporaneity: Historical Presence in Visual Culture as ‘Spinifex People as Cold War Moderns.’

Previous Page: Paint Boxes of Spinifex Artists Left page: Road to Tjuntjuntjara, Great Victoria Desert Source: © Photos Courtesy of Amanda Dent - Spinifex Arts Project

Various Spinifex Artists (MEN’S COLLABORATIVE)

Pila Ngura Acrylic on Linen 290 x 200cm 15-001a

Four senior Spinifex artists, Ned Grant, Simon Hogan, Lawrence Pennington, and Roy Underwood, have collaborated on this major canvas depicting significant sites within the Spinifex country. Each artist has painted the sites and the Tjukurpa (the stories of spirit beings and events that bought creation into the world) that they have the authority and knowledge to paint. Each man also has an intimate knowledge of the country and Tjukurpa being depicted by the other artists, to whom they are related by blood and the land. In this way, the artists work together and link the painting and stories to unveil an extensive representation of Spinifex Country. Most Tjukurpa have many levels and only a brief outline can be shared with the public and often most must be withheld. Ned Grant has depicted the significant site of Tjutjuna, a large water source surrounded by smaller seasonal water holes. Again, this water source is guarded by a mythical snake man, Wati Pana Kura (Desert Death Adder Man) who keeps watch over sacred objects, a kulata and mirra (a spear and spear thrower). Simon Hogan has painted his birthplace of Lingka and other significant sites of Paltju and Tjining. All of these sites are linked by the Minyma Wanampi (Water Serpent Woman) songline. This Tjukurpa follows the trials of a young boy who confronts the serpent women. Simon Hogan depicts the wanari (mulga tree) and para (white gum) trees that grow close to these water sources. These trees have a spiritual and practical significance for Anangu (Indigenous people). Lawrence Pennington has painted the significant site of Nyuman, a place of tall trees where the Wati Walawyru (Wedge Tailed Eagle Man) lives and searches for the Nganamara Tjitji (Mallee Fowl Children). Again Lawrence has painted a large portion of country associated with this Tjukurpa. Roy Underwood has painted the significant site of Walpatjara, a dangerous site that is guarded by many Wanampi (creator water serpents) who must be pacified before entering. Roy states that it is very dangerous for uninitiated men or anyone without the knowledge to try to enter this site and that a ferocious wind will be made by the Wanampi who reside here.

Ned GRANT Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1941 Pitjantjatjara Papatatjara Pitjantjatjara

Ned Grant went through the Law his brother, Fred Grant, in the ranges north of Laverton, after being brought in to the Cundeelee Mission. As a senior man in early 1980’s, he helped coordinate the return to Spinifex country and today, he is the main ceremonial leader of the Tjintu (sun side) of Spinifex society. Ned has been painting with the Spinifex Art Project since its beginning in 1997 and had worked on the inaugural Men’s Native Title Painting. Ned has not been a proliﬁc individual painter but he has been an integral contributor to various men’s collaborative paintings.

Simon HOGAN Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1930 Pitjantjatjara Paltju Pitjantjatjara

An effusive individual who introduces himself as “Mr. Hogan”, Simon Hogan is a tireless ambassador for Spinifex custom and culture. Although he spoke no English, he is a conﬁdent, initiated Pitjantjatjara man who addressed senior government ofﬁcials regarding ownership of country and culture. In 1997, when the Spinifex people began painting traditional stories with acrylic paints on canvas, Simon Hogan took the lead, working with intense concentration and focus to translate Tjukurpa into public artworks. Over the years, Simon Hogan’s enthusiasm and focus for painting has not diminished. His status as a painter in his own community and on a national and international level has steadily increased over these years making him one of the most soughtafter Spinifex artists.

Lawrence PENNINGTON Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1934 Pitjantjatjara Urlu Pitjantjatjara

Like his contemporaries, Lawrence Pennington was pulled in to the Cundeelee Mission in the late 1950s. His initiations as a young man in the country have given him intimate knowledge in a physical as well as a spiritual sense of the sites and stories of the area he was born and responsible for. Lawrence started painting with the Spinifex Arts Project in 1999, collaboratively and individually, before leaving Tjuntjuntjara for about 7 years. He has now returned on a permanent basis when his only son went through Men’s Law at Tjuntjuntjara.

Roy UNDERWOOD Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1937 Pitjantjatjara Tjutajara Pitjantjatjara

With Kumanara Anderson and other senior men and women, Roy Underwood was a major driving force in returning the Spinifex people to their country and representing and negotiating the unbroken connection to country. Roy continues to be a venerated Elder and is routinely elected to Spinifex Land Council and Tjuntjuntjara Community Council. Roy has a unique painting style somewhat reminiscent of Kiwirkurra mens’ designs from Pintupi country and has inﬂuenced other artists with his bold and sometimes geometric designs. He is a strong force within the Spinifex Arts Project and a much sought-after painter.

Work In Progress for Spinifex Menâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Collaborative Painting (15

Source: ÂŠ Photos Courtesy of Spinifex Arts Project and Claudia Jocher

5-001a)

Various Spinifex Artists (MEN’S COLLABORATIVE)

Kaanka Acrylic on Linen 290 x 200cm 15-79

Five senior Spinifex men, Fred Grant, Simon Hogan, Lawrence Pennington, Winmati Roberts and Roy Underwood, have collaborated on this major painting depicting Spinifex country in the Great Victoria Desert. The men expressed that several Tjukurpa (creation line) were running through the canvas with the main Tjukurpa being that of Minyma Tjuta Kaanka (many crow women). The women begin their journey in Spinifex country at a site called Kapitjalu, a major rockhole. Here they feast on puya (bean bush) before travelling southeast and eventually ending their journey at iron Knob. Two other Tjukurpa also traverse this canvas and were mentioned within the context of the painting. However, due to the restrictions associated with them, the men did not elaborate further. One involved the Kurunpa (spirit) and the other involved the throwing of an object toward a large and dangerous liru (poisonous snake).

Fred GRANT Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1943 Pitjantjatjara Ukatjatjara Pitjantjatjara

Fred Grant went through the Law with older brother and ngalungku (contemporary initiate), Ned Grant, in the ranges north of Laverton, after being brought in to the Cundeelee Mission. With his extraordinary knowledge of Spinifex Tjukurpa and its myriad of inherent songlines, Fred has taken on the role of director on most of the men’s collaboratives. Although his own works are locality speciﬁc, they give the impression of covering broad swathes of country, and could be interpreted as subtler versions of the Men’s Native Title Paintings in 1997. Fred’s wife, Carlene West, from Tjitjiti, is also a renowned painter of Spinifex Arts Project.

Simon HOGAN Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1930 Pitjantjatjara Paltju Pitjantjatjara

Lawrence PENNINGTON Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1934 Pitjantjatjara Urlu Pitjantjatjara

Winmati ROBERTS Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1958 Pitjantjatjara Umuwa Pitjantjatjara

Winmati Roberts is descended from a line of renowned artists. His mother, the late Wingu Tingima, was one of the best-known and respected painters and his father, the late Lima Tingima, was an inspirational ﬁgure in Winmati’s life, passing on his great knowledge of the country and Law to his son. As a young man, Winmati worked on the bore program, a project supporting Anangu’s desire to return to country. He also helped to establish the community of Nyapari where he lived for many years. Winmati paints the Wati Kutjara Tjukurpa of Pukara, a story depicting two snakes, a father and son travelling across country during ceremonial time.

Roy UNDERWOOD Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1937 Pitjantjatjara Tjutajara Pitjantjatjara

With Kumanara Anderson and other senior men and women, Roy Underwood was a major driving force in returning the Spinifex people to their country and representing and negotiating the unbroken connection to country. Roy continues to be a venerated Elder and is routinely elected to Spinifex Land Council and Tjuntjuntjara Community Council. Roy has a unique painting style somewhat reminiscent of Kiwirkurra mensâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; designs from Pintupi country and has inďŹ&#x201A;uenced other artists with his bold and sometimes geometric designs. He is a strong force within the Spinifex Arts Project and a much sought-after painter.

Paint Room at Spinifex Arts Project Source: ÂŠ Photo Courtesy of ReDot Fine Art Gallery

Various Spinifex Artists (MEN’S COLLABORATIVE)

Tjukurpa Acrylic on Linen 290 x 200cm 15-230

Seven senior Spinifex Artists have worked together to create this majestic collaborative painting - Fred Grant, Simon Hogan, Lawrence Pennington, Patju Presley, Ian Rictor, Winmati Roberts and Roy Underwood. The men have painted a swath of Spinifex country stretching from the far northern borders to South Australia in the east and the southern edges that border the plains. The country depicted also has numerous creation lines intersecting at multiple significant locations. Each man has painted country he is intimately associated with, either through birth right, family linage or totemic responsibility and each man’s country can intertwine with another’s geographically or through the movement of ancestral beings as they created the Tjukurpa, or the Law by which people are governed. Fred Grant has depicted the significant site of Mampanya where Minyma Nyulu (Golden Bandicoot Women) resided. Simon Hogan, who has an encyclopaedic knowledge of Spinifex country, has depicted his customary place of Lingka, a significant site where Minyma Wanampi (a female ancestral water serpent) resides. Lawrence Pennington has painted his country of Mituna where Wati Kutjara (a father and son water serpent travelling into Spinifex Country from further north) spent some considerable time. Patju Presley has depicted his country of Makura Piti, the significant site where Wati Ngintaka (Perentie Man) and Minyma Nyulu (Golden Bandicoot Women) begin their journey west. Ian Rictor has painted Tuwan, the place of Tjilpu Tjuta (Many Birds) and tells of the creation line of the bird people. Roy Underwood has depicted the significant water source of Kaanka where the Minyma Kaanka (Crow Women) fought and eventually killed the Wati Wanampi (Male ancestral water serpent) who resided in the rockhole of the same name. Each artist joins in on the others retelling of the Tjukurpa, the journeys and escapades that the ancestral beings undertook to create the living landscapes whilst depicting framework of karmic laws that Anangu could live within.

Fred GRANT Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1943 Pitjantjatjara Ukatjatjara Pitjantjatjara

Simon HOGAN Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1930 Pitjantjatjara Paltju Pitjantjatjara

Lawrence PENNINGTON Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1934 Pitjantjatjara Urlu Pitjantjatjara

Patju PRESLEY Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1945 Pitjantjatjara Itaratjara Pitjantjatjara

Patju Presley is a senior Pitjantjatjara Law man with great knowledge of the geography of the Western Desert and the associated Tjukurpa, and has led a traditional lifestyle as a young child. Patju is also a strong cultural man who practices traditional cultural business and inma (ceremonial singing and dancing). Patju currently resides at both Irrunytju and Tjuntjuntjara Communities with his wife, Ivy Laidlaw. In his paintings, Patju refers to many of the Tjukurpa of the country of the Great Victoria Desert. His images are visual representations of the epic journeys and creation stories of the country.

Ian RICTOR Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1960 Pitjantjatjara Artulin / Tuwan Pitjantjatjara

Ian Rictor and his family emerged from the bush only in 1986, the last of the known Indigenous people to make ﬁrst contact with contemporary Australia. In 1997, when the Spinifex Arts Project began, Ian Rictor was keen to join. He took to the medium of paint on canvas with ﬂuency and has been painting his birthplace and surrounding country since then. He has had increasing success exhibiting with the Spinifex Artists internationally and in Australia. Ian is also a skilled hunter, bush mechanic and craftsman. He lives in Tjuntjuntjara with his wife Kathleen (Kanta) Donnegan, also an artist of Spinifex Arts Project.

Winmati ROBERTS Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1958 Pitjantjatjara Umuwa Pitjantjatjara

Roy UNDERWOOD Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1937 Pitjantjatjara Tjutajara Pitjantjatjara

With Kumanara Anderson and other senior men and women, Roy Underwood was a major driving force in returning the Spinifex people to their country and representing and negotiating the unbroken connection to country. Roy continues to be a venerated Elder and is routinely elected to Spinifex Land Council and Tjuntjuntjara Community Council. Roy has a unique painting style somewhat reminiscent of Kiwirkurra mensâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; designs from Pintupi country and has inďŹ&#x201A;uenced other artists with his bold and sometimes geometric designs. He is a strong force within the Spinifex Arts Project and a much sought-after painter.

Work In Progress for Spinifex Menâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Collaborative Painting (15

Source: ÂŠ Photos Courtesy of Amanda Dent - Spinifex Arts Project

5-230)

Various Spinifex Artists (WOMEN’S COLLABORATIVE)

Minyma Tjuta Acrylic on Linen 290 x 200cm 15-206

Collaborative paintings are signature pieces for the Spinifex Artists and are often painted on location. In this work, four senior women, Kathleen (Kanta) Donnegan, Estelle Hogan, Myrtle Pennintgton and Tjaruwa (Angelina) Woods, have collaborated to paint the Minyma Tjuta (Seven Sisters) Tjukurpa incorporating two younger emerging artists, Debbie Hansen and Lois Pennington as a way of handing down skills and knowledge. This painting enacts the story of a group of unmarried sisters who emerged at Pukara and are now travelling across and living from the land. They are busily in pursuit of Wati Kuniya (a male python) whom they chase and tease throughout the landscape. The seven sisters are themselves being pursued by Wati Nyiru, a cheeky old man who is very keen to catch and claim one of the younger sisters as a wife. Movements, tracks, activities and campsites of the sisters are shown, as are those of the clever Nyiru who is never far behind, camping just out of site. Because Minyma Tjuta belongs to a prominent and very detailed Tjukurpa, all areas throughout Spinifex country (and beyond) touched by the sisters, Nyiru or the wider Minyma Tjuta story are sacred and covered by strict protocol and responsibilities.

Kathleen (Kanta) DONNEGAN Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1944 Pitjantjatjara Kapi Piti Kutjara Pitjantjatjara

Kathleen (Kanta) Donnegan is married to Ian Rictor - her kuri pikitja, often translated as “promised one”. As if forged by the early years in her country, Kathleen is a gentle soul and has assiduously painted with the Spinifex Art Project since representing her country in the Women’s Native Title Painting in 1997. Kathleen has painted on most of the women’s collaboratives produced by the Spinifex women. Her works are succinct and economic but also fulsome without being over busy. In effect, they are patently honest portrayals of her country - an epitome of the artist herself.

Estelle HOGAN Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1937 Pitjantjatjara Paltjatjara Pitjantjatjara

Estelle Hogan is the wife of Simon Hogan. In Spinifex society, Estelle is regarded as “minyma pulka mulapa”, a truly important woman, as she is the mother of ﬁve sons who have entered into Men’s Law. Estelle also has a deep and extensive knowledge of her country and its connections to other women’s country through Women’s Tjukurpa. Since 1997, she has contributed to every women’s collaborative produced by Spinifex Arts. Like her personality, Estelle’s paintings are colourful and bold, often portraying the array of rockholes and soaks in the Seven Sisters Tjukurpa.

Myrtle PENNINGTON Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1939 Pitjantjatjara Kanpa Pitjantjatjara

Myrtle Pennington’s journey to Cundeelee Mission in the late 1950’s was particularly tragic - a son and her husband had perished during the trip. Myrtle, with another son and daughter, were eventually located by Australian servicemen and taken to the Cundeelee Mission. Even though Myrtle did not work on the Women’s Native Title Painting in 1997, she gradually came into the Spinifex Arts Project through the women’s collaborative works. She was mostly an occasional painter until the past decade when almost overnight she developed a most striking, minimal style with bold symbols that leap out against a vividly plain background.

Tjaruwa (Angelina) WOODS Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1954 Pitjantjatjara Warutjara Pitjantjatjara

Tjaruwa (Angelina) Woods lived traditionally until the winter of 1986 when her family of seven was located in northern Spinifex, last of the known Indigenous people to make ﬁrst contact with contemporary Australia. When Tjaruwa settled in Tjuntjuntjara, her immediate priority was to care for her mother and uncle living in their new circumstances and it was not until her mother passed away that she took up an interest in painting. With the accumulated experience of her other life and her mother’s stories/designs, Tjaruwa’s unique Spinifex perspective was translated with spectacular style and technique onto canvas.

Work In Progress for Spinifex Womenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Collaborative Painting

Source: ÂŠ Photos Courtesy of Amanda Dent - Spinifex Arts Project

g (15-206)

Various Spinifex Artists (WOMEN’S COLLABORATIVE)

Minyma Tjuta Acrylic on Linen 233 x 197cm 13198

Seven senior Spinifex women, Kunmanara (Linda) Coleman, Kathleen (Kanta) Donnegan, Kunmanara (Anne Ngantiri) Hogan, Estelle Hogan, Myrtle Pennington, Kunmanara (Yarangka Elaine) Thomas and Tjaruwa (Angelina) Woods, have collaborated on this major work, an epic story which covers a vast tract of Spinifex Lands. It is the Kungkarangkalpa Tjukurpa (Seven Sisters), also referred to as Minyma Tjuta. Minyma Tjuta is perhaps the most substantial and overtly women’s Tjukurpa from the Spinifex area that weaves across and through much of the country, profoundly affecting the sites, ceremonial connections and responsibilities of the people. The song line travels out west and east far beyond the Spinifex territory into neighbouring lands. As such, Minyma Tjuta is intimate to the cultural cycles of the broader Western Desert region and features prominently in many Spinifex paintings as it traverses far across and through the country. This is miil-miilpa (sacred) and has numerous layers of knowledge and comprehension available depending on the status of the viewer according to Anangu Law. In this Tjukurpa, a group of sisters are travelling and pursuing a large python which proves to be elusive and is followed through various important sites such as Kuru Ala and Kulyuru. The snake leaves in its wake several signiﬁcant landforms such as deep ravines at Kulyuru where it escaped down a hole in the escarpment and heading north creating a large creek bed. The women are in turn being pursued by a lustful old man who wants Kampukura the eldest sister for a wife. He camps close to the sisters hiding and spying on them in order to strike out in surprise and catch the one he wants. The sisters take off to the east. They ﬂy up into the sky thus creating the constellation known as Pleiades. This story is full of sexual innuendo pertinent to women and men in different aspects. It is present at literally hundreds of Spinifex sites. The women listed some of such sites in this work including Tjulapi, Tjawanya, Tjutjunga, Tolunga, Paltatatjara, Atinga, Pilkatja, Makuritjara, Ngalkuritjara, Pukara, Kuru Ala and Kulyuru.

Kunmanara (Linda) COLEMAN Birth Date Deceased Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1957 2014 Pitjantjatjara Great Victoria Desert Pitjantjatjara

Kunmanara (Linda) Coleman was a member of the Spinifex people born into the Great Victoria Desert in the late 1950’s. As a young child, she travelled with her parents to the mission at Cundeelee along with other Spinifex people due to the atomic testing at the time. She was just beginning her career as an artist with the Spinifex Arts Project when she passed away in 2014.

Kathleen (Kanta) DONNEGAN Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1944 Pitjantjatjara Kapi Piti Kutjara Pitjantjatjara

Kunmanara (Anne Ngantiri) HOGAN Birth Date Deceased Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1945 2014 Pitjantjatjara Tjulapi Pitjantjatjara

Kunmanara (Anne Ngantiri) Hogan joined the Spinifex artists around 2001, travelling with the group on painting trips out bush to record and document her extensive knowledge of the Spinifex area, particularly where she was born and grew up as a young girl. This knowledge proved invaluable when Kunmanara Hogan worked on Women’s Collaborative paintings, where sacred sites in the Western Desert were discussed and recorded in paint such as the Seven Sisters. She was a meticulous painter with a well-reﬁned sense of colour and composition and her works have been included in both private and public institutions.

Estelle HOGAN Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1937 Pitjantjatjara Paltjatjara Pitjantjatjara

Myrtle PENNINGTON Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1939 Pitjantjatjara Kanpa Pitjantjatjara

Kunmanara (Yarangka Elaine) THOMAS Birth Date Deceased Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1939 August 2015 Pitjantjatjara Ngalkuritjara Pitjantjatjara

Kunmanara (Yarangka Elaine) Thomas was a highly-esteemed senior Spinifex woman who began painting with the Spinifex Arts Project from its inception in 1997. As Kunmanara Thomas’ country is traversed by a highly-signiﬁcant men’s Tjukurpa, she commanded respect and authority in her society which she modestly carried. Her knowledge of country and Tjukurpa added depth to the collaborative paintings which Spinifex women are well-known for. From the beginning of the project, Kunmanara Thomas painted easily with the strength and authority of one who was secure in the knowledge of her country and self.

Tjaruwa (Angelina) WOODS Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1954 Pitjantjatjara Warutjara Pitjantjatjara

Work In Progress for Spinifex Womenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Collaborative Painting

Source: ÂŠ Photos Courtesy of Spinifex Arts Project

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Various Spinifex Artists (WOMEN’S COLLABORATIVE)

Minyma Tjuta Acrylic on Linen 233 x 197cm 14008

Eight senior Spinifex women, Kathleen (Kanta) Donnegan, Debbie Hansen, Kunmanara (Anne Ngantiri) Hogan, Estelle Hogan, Myrtle Pennington, Ngalpingka Simms, Kunmanara (Yarangka Elaine) Thomas and Tjaruwa (Angelina) Woods, have collaborated on this major work, an epic story which covers a vast tract of Spinifex Lands. It is the Tjukurpa of Kungkarangkalpa, the Seven Sisters also referred to as Minyma Tjuta. Minyma Tjuta is perhaps the most substantial and overtly women’s Tjukurpa from the Spinifex area that weaves across and through much of the country, profoundly affecting the sites, ceremonial connections and responsibilities of the people. The songline travels out west and east far beyond the Spinifex territory into neighbouring lands. As such, Minyma Tjuta is intimate to the cultural cycles of the broader Western Desert region and features prominently in many Spinifex paintings as it traverses far across and through the country. This is miil-miilpa (dangerously sacred) and has numerous layers of knowledge and comprehension available depending on the status of the viewer according to Anangu Law. In this Tjukurpa, a group of sisters are travelling and trying to avoid the unwanted attention of a lustful old man, Wati Nyiiru who is pursuing them. He camps close to the sisters, hiding and spying on them in order to strike out in surprise and catch the one he wants. The sisters take off to the east. They ﬂy up into the sky thus creating the constellation known as Pleiades. This story is full of sexual innuendo pertinent to women and men in different aspects. It is present at literally hundreds of Spinifex sites. The women listed some of such sites in this work including Kuru Ala, Tuwan, Kunyakunytju, Wiyara, Kamanti, Tjun Tjun, Paltatatjara, Ngalkuritjara, Minga, Kulyuru and Cundalee. The circular motifs in the work signify the rock holes created by the women (spirit beings) as they travelled through the country. They also represent the body designs painted the young women after a woman ﬁrst menstruates in a ritual where a woman emerges through the smoke marking the transition from girlhood to womanhood. All these senior women experienced this.

Kathleen (Kanta) DONNEGAN Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1944 Pitjantjatjara Kapi Piti Kutjara Pitjantjatjara

Debbie HANSEN Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1967 Pitjantjatjara Cundeelee Pitjantjatjara

Debbie Hansen’s family was initially brought in to Cundeelee in 1958, where Debbie was born, but they eventually returned to the Great Victoria Desert, to homelands. In 1997, when the Spinifex Art Project started, Debbie mainly painted the stories of her birth place. She also assisted and learnt from her aunt Lucy Hogan, a senior Spinifex woman and premier painter. When Lucy passed away in 2003, Debbie “inherited” Lucy’s stories and designs from the Spinifex area and began to use them as the basis of her own paintings. Debbie is currently living at Tjuntjuntjara and has also participated in many collaborative works with senior Spinifex women.

Kunmanara (Anne Ngantiri) HOGAN Birth Date Deceased Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1945 2014 Pitjantjatjara Tjulapi Pitjantjatjara

Estelle HOGAN Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1937 Pitjantjatjara Paltjatjara Pitjantjatjara

Myrtle PENNINGTON Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1939 Pitjantjatjara Kanpa Pitjantjatjara

Ngalpingka SIMMS Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1945 Ngaanyatjarra Wayiyul Ngaanyatjarra

Ngalpingka Simms spent her early days living a traditional lifestyle with her small family group and later moved into the Warburton Mission where many Ngaanyatjarra people settled. She spent many years at Warburton living a semi-nomadic lifestyle and participating in traditional ceremony. Now living at Tjuntjuntjara and married to Spinifex elder Lennard Walker, Ngalpingka paints with the Spinifex Arts Project. She has participated with the Spinifex Artists since 1998 and is a valuable and knowledgeable member of the group who paints her homeland area associated with the Minyma Tjuta (Seven Sisters) as well as collaborative paintings.

Kunmanara (Yarangka Elaine) THOMAS Birth Date Deceased Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1939 August 2015 Pitjantjatjara Ngalkuritjara Pitjantjatjara

Tjaruwa (Angelina) WOODS Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1954 Pitjantjatjara Warutjara Pitjantjatjara

Various Spinifex Artists (WOMEN’S COLLABORATIVE)

Kungkarangkalpa Acrylic on Linen 230 x 200cm 15-009

The senior women of the Spinifex People have collaborated on this major work to paint the Kungkarangkalpa (Seven Sisters), a major Western Desert Tjukurpa. The seven artists involved are Kathleen (Kanta) Donnegan, Debbie Hansen, Estelle Hogan, Lois Pennington, Myrtle Pennington, Kunmanara (Yarangka Elaine) Thomas , and Tjaruwa (Angelina) Woods. Tjukurpa is the Pitjantjatjara concept for describing the formative creation where ancestral beings create the world. These beings are Anangu ancestors, who can take the form of people, plants or animals. They traverse the country; forming the world we live in, creating the waterholes, the trees, the clay pans, the rocky outcrops, the sand hills and the Spinifex plains. These land formations are the physical manifestation of the creation energy and tangible evidence that this Tjukurpa is true. Kungkarangkalpa is an epic songline in the Western Desert and tells the story of seven women traveling throughout the desert hunting and carrying out ritual obligations all the while being pursued by a cheeky old man in pursuit of a wife. Nyiru is capable of changing form and does this on occasion in order to trick the women. Many parts of the story are secret and involve a sexual element. Only the public details of this story are allowed to be put down in paint. SpeciďŹ c sites the women have painted here include Purpur, Paltatjatjara, Cundalee, Tjuntjala, Pirapi, Kuru Ala and Kulyuru.

Kathleen (Kanta) DONNEGAN Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1944 Pitjantjatjara Kapi Piti Kutjara Pitjantjatjara

Debbie HANSEN Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1967 Pitjantjatjara Cundeelee Pitjantjatjara

Estelle HOGAN Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1937 Pitjantjatjara Paltjatjara Pitjantjatjara

Lois PENNINGTON Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1957 Pitjantjatjara Great Victoria Desert Pitjantjatjara

Lois Pennington was a young girl when her family was brought into the Cundeelee Mission. When Cundeelee closed, she moved to Coonana where she resided for many years. By this time, the Spinifex people were expressing their desire to return to their traditional homelands. A makeshift camp was established at Yakatunya before the group ﬁnally made the trip back to Tjuntjuntjara. Lois did not return to Tjuntjuntjara until in the early 2000’s but was a frequent visitor, connecting with family and fulﬁlling her cultural obligations back in the Spinifex lands. She began painting with Spinifex Arts Project in recent years and started exhibiting in group shows in 2015.

Myrtle PENNINGTON Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1939 Pitjantjatjara Kanpa Pitjantjatjara

Kunmanara (Yarangka Elaine) THOMAS Birth Date Deceased Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1939 August 2015 Pitjantjatjara Ngalkuritjara Pitjantjatjara

Tjaruwa (Angelina) WOODS Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1954 Pitjantjatjara Warutjara Pitjantjatjara

Work In Progress for Spinifex Womenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Collaborative Painting

Source: ÂŠ Photos Courtesy of Amanda Dent - Spinifex Arts Project

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Various Spinifex Artists (WOMEN’S COLLABORATIVE)

Minyma Tjuta Acrylic on Linen 230 x 200cm 15-003

Four senior Spinifex women, Kathleen (Kanta) Donnegan, Myrtle Pennington, Ngalpingka Simms and Tjaruwa (Angelina) Woods, have collaborated on this major Spinifex painting that depicts the Minyma Tjuta (Kungkarangkalpa or Seven Sisters) Tjukurpa. Tjukurpa is the Pitjantjatjara concept for describing the formative creation where ancestral beings create the world. These beings are Anangu ancestors, who can take the form of people, plants or animals. They traverse the country, forming the world we live in, creating the waterholes, the trees, the clay pans, the rocky outcrops, the sand hills and the spinifex plains. These land formations are the physical manifestation of the creation energy and tangible evidence that this Tjukurpa is true. The Minyma Tjuta, also known as Kungkarangkalpa, is a signiďŹ cant Tjukurpa in Spinifex country traversing a huge distance and including numerous sacred places. Each artist has a signiďŹ cant relationship with this Tjukurpa as it passes through sites, which they have responsibilities for. The Tjukurpa is partly a coming-of-age story and involves a group of sisters who are travelling through country and are being pursued by a lustful older man, named Nyiru who desires the older sister. Nyiru is also a mystic or magician and is able to shape shift and to take on the appearance of animals. The artists spoke at length about the depiction of Nyiru taking on the form of a large Kuniya (a prized and edible carpet python) and getting the women into a digging frenzy, making them dig across large tracts of country following the tracks of the elusive Kuniya only to eventually be confronted with the fact that it was Nyiru all along.

Kathleen (Kanta) DONNEGAN Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1944 Pitjantjatjara Kapi Piti Kutjara Pitjantjatjara

Myrtle PENNINGTON Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1939 Pitjantjatjara Kanpa Pitjantjatjara

Ngalpingka SIMMS Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1945 Ngaanyatjarra Wayiyul Ngaanyatjarra

Tjaruwa (Angelina) WOODS Birth Date Language Place of Birth Skin/Clan

circa 1954 Pitjantjatjara Warutjara Pitjantjatjara

Work In Progress for Spinifex Womenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Collaborative Painting

Source: ÂŠ Photos Courtesy of Spinifex Arts Project and Claudia Jocher

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Visiting Spinifex Art Centre & Meeting Spinifex Artists during

Source: ÂŠ Photo Courtesy of ReDot Fine Art Gallery

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