Collection Online
Medium
synthetic polymer paint on canvas
Measurements
181.0 × 121.0 cm
Place/s of Execution
Muyinga, Western Australia
Accession Number
2001.177
Department
First Nations Australia
Credit Line
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Presented through the NGV Foundation by Elizabeth and Colin Laverty, Governors, 2001
© The Artist/Licensed by Aboriginal Artists Agency Limited
This digital record has been made available on NGV Collection Online through the generous support of The Vizard Foundation
Gallery location
Not on display
Physical description
The artist represents Ngurrapalangu, a hill and claypan site to the west of Walungurru that was his own conception place. Here the kungka kutjarra (two women) brought a being called Tjuntamartu (Short-legs). The women were frightened by the approach of the old man and they fled to Lake Mackay, while Tjuntamartu ran and crawled inside a cave, frantically tossing out the sacred objects stored there to make room for himself. These sacred objects became the hill called Wintalynga, which lies south of the several large claypans of Ngurrapalangu, itself represented as a cave (indicated by the large central roundel). The hill of Wintalynga is perpendicular to the hill where the cave is located and is where the travelling women left Tjuntamurtu behind. They set him down while they danced a woman’s dance, thereby creating the claypans. After rainfall these claypans are the source of a seed bearing plant known as mungilpa whose seeds are ground into cakes and eaten. The artist’s mother ate these seedcakes and thus he was conceived and therefore his conception Dreaming is said to be Tjuntamurtu, connected to both the old man story and the two woman Dreaming.