Description

Details

• Type: Screenprint
• Edition: 99
• Paper: Arches BFK
• Size: 760 x 560 (image and paper)
• Printer: Basil Hall, Basil Hall Editions Darwin December 2006

Story

At Mina Mina women were living and having women’s ceremony, they were also at Warlpalpa (soakage water). The Napangardi/Napurrurla women were weaving Jirnjirla (white feathers) around their heads. An old man named Jarlkijarlki Jakamarra was watching them from his country Munyuparnti-parnti, near Mt Dennison. He went up to them and took them towards the east. Jakamarra took them to a place called Yalankirri that is in Alawarri Country. The Jakamarra was singing love songs for them and so he left them at Yalankirri. While he was singing he made the ladies put their hands behind their backs. The ladies stopped at this place called Yalankirri forever and Jakamarra Jarlkijarlki came back to Munyuparnti-parnti. Before Jakamarra man took the women east the women made a big wee at Munyuparnti-parnti and they made a big hole in the ground and this hole is called Munyparnti-parnti and in this story also the Jakamarra man was rubbing his hand on his private parts so he could have all the women to himself

Artist Biography: Judy Napangardi Watson

c1925-2016

Judy Napangardi Watson was born at Yarungkanyi (Mt. Doreen Station), at the time when many Warlpiri and other Central and Western Desert Peoples were living a traditional nomadic life. With her family Judy made many trips on foot to her country and lived for long periods at Mina Mina and Yingipurlangu, her ancestral country on the border of the Tanami and Gibson Deserts. These places are rich in bush tucker such as wanakiji bush plums, yakajirri bush tomatoes, and wardapi, sand goanna. Judy frequently went hunting in the country west of Yuendumu, near her homelands. Judy was taught painting by her elder sister, Maggie Napangardi Watson. She painted alongside her at Warlukurlangu Artists Aboriginal Corporation, an Aboriginal owned and governed art centre in Yuendumu, for a number of years, developing her own unique style. Though a very tiny woman Judy had ten children, four of whom she outlived. She was a woman of incredible energy; this was transmitted to her work through her dynamic use of colour, and energetic “dragged dotting” style. She was at the forefront of a move towards more abstract rendering of Jukurrpa by Warlpiri artists; however her work retains strong kurruwarri, the details which tell of the sacredness of place and song in her culture.

Judy was an active member of Warlukurlangu Artists of Yuendumu in Central Australia, Northern Territory from when  it was established in 1989 until she passed away.

The artist was paid royalties in full at the time the print was editioned.