This painting depicts Karlamilyi, also known as Rudall River National Park. It is situated in between the communities of Parnngurr and Punmu and is a very beautiful and important area. Rudall River runs through Karlamilyi into Nyayartakujarra, or Lake Dora, a very large salt warla (lake). Karlamilyi is Warnman country.
“Wilyamitimiti, man eater, only self. He been walk around Kulyakartu area. Marlkarri (dead) kukurrpa (kind of devil), he been have a plenty people in dreaming time, cook him up, eat him eat plenty in the night time. He been living in a cave. Lightning from Kaljali (Jaramarra spring), my jila (ancestral snake) from another place, jila place. From yapu (hill) that lightning been shut him up. [He] tried to get up, nothing. Rain been come.”
– Wokka Taylor
The term jukurrpa is often translated in English as the ‘dreaming’, or ‘dreamtime’. It refers generally to the period in which the world was created by ancestral beings, who assumed both human and nonhuman forms. This painting depicts a Warnman jukurrpa (dreaming) story of Wilyamitimiti, a sole man eating devil living in the Kulyakartu area who would hunt for his victims at night. Eventually Wilyamitimiti was forever entombed in a cave by rocks falling during a lightning storm sent by the ancestral snake, Kaljali, from the north of Martu country.
I take my inspiration from the saltwater country on my Grandfather’s side and the Quinkan County on my Grandmother’s side
This painting depicts a sacred site at ‘Kurrurldul’, an outstation south of Maningrida.
The ‘rarrk’, or abstract crosshatching, on this work represents the design for the crow totem ancestor called ‘Djimarr’. Today this being exists in the form of a rock, which is permanently submerged at the bottom of Kurrurldul Creek. The ‘Djimarr’ rock in the stream at Kurrurldul is said to move around and call out in a soft hooting tone at night. Both the stone itself and the area around it are considered sacred.
The imagery represents the rock mentioned above at the bottom of Kurrurldul creek, which is the final transmutation of the dreaming ancestor ‘Djimarr’. Finally, the pattern used here is also the crow design used in the sacred ‘Mardayin’ ceremony, which is a large regional patri-moiety ceremony now rarely conducted in central and eastern Arnhem Land.
“When Martu paint, it’s like a map. Martu draw story on the ground and on the canvas, and all the circle and line there are the hunting areas and different waters and tracks where people used to walk, and [some you] can’t cross, like boundaries. So nowadays you see a colourful painting and wonder what it is, but that’s how Martu tell story long ago. It’s not just a lovely painting, it’s a story and a songline and a history and everything that goes with it.”
– Ngalangka Nola Taylor and Joshua Booth
This work portrays an area of Country that can be interpreted in multiple ways. Firstly, the image may be read as an aerial representation of a particular location known to the artist- either land that they or their family travelled, from the pujiman (traditional, desert dwelling) era to now. During the pujiman period, Martu would traverse very large distances annually in small family groups, moving seasonally from water source to water source, and hunting and gathering bush tucker as they went. At this time, one’s survival depended on their intimate knowledge of the location of resources; thus physical elements of Country, such as sources of kapi (water), tali (sandhills), different varieties of warta (trees, vegetation), ngarrini (camps), and jina (tracks) are typically recorded with the use of a use of a system of iconographic forms universally shared across the desert.
An additional layer of meaning in the work relates to more intangible concepts; life cycles based around kalyu (rain, water) and waru (fire) are also often evident. A thousands of year old practice, fire burning continues to be carried out as both an aid for hunting and a means of land management today. As the Martu travelled and hunted they would burn tracts of land, ensuring plant and animal biodiversity and reducing the risk of unmanageable, spontaneous bush fires. The patchwork nature of regrowth is evident in many landscape works, with each of the five distinctive phases of fire burning visually described with respect to the cycle of burning and regrowth.
Finally, metaphysical information relating to a location may also be recorded; jukurrpa (dreaming) narratives chronicle the creation of physical landmarks, and can be referenced through depictions of ceremonial sites, songlines, and markers left in the land. Very often, however, information relating to jukurrpa is censored by omission, or alternatively painted over with dotted patterns.
“When Martu paint, it’s like a map. Martu draw story on the ground and on the canvas, and all the circle and line there are the hunting areas and different waters and tracks where people used to walk, and [some you] can’t cross, like boundaries. So nowadays you see a colourful painting and wonder what it is, but that’s how Martu tell story long ago. It’s not just a lovely painting, it’s a story and a songline and a history and everything that goes with it.”
– Ngalangka Nola Taylor and Joshua Booth
This work portrays an area of Country that can be interpreted in multiple ways. Firstly, the image may be read as an aerial representation of a particular location known to the artist- either land that they or their family travelled, from the pujiman (traditional, desert dwelling) era to now. During the pujiman period, Martu would traverse very large distances annually in small family groups, moving seasonally from water source to water source, and hunting and gathering bush tucker as they went. At this time, one’s survival depended on their intimate knowledge of the location of resources; thus physical elements of Country, such as sources of kapi (water), tali (sandhills), different varieties of warta (trees, vegetation), ngarrini (camps), and jina (tracks) are typically recorded with the use of a use of a system of iconographic forms universally shared across the desert.
An additional layer of meaning in the work relates to more intangible concepts; life cycles based around kalyu (rain, water) and waru (fire) are also often evident. A thousands of year old practice, fire burning continues to be carried out as both an aid for hunting and a means of land management today. As the Martu travelled and hunted they would burn tracts of land, ensuring plant and animal biodiversity and reducing the risk of unmanageable, spontaneous bush fires. The patchwork nature of regrowth is evident in many landscape works, with each of the five distinctive phases of fire burning visually described with respect to the cycle of burning and regrowth.
Finally, metaphysical information relating to a location may also be recorded; jukurrpa (dreaming) narratives chronicle the creation of physical landmarks, and can be referenced through depictions of ceremonial sites, songlines, and markers left in the land. Very often, however, information relating to jukurrpa is censored by omission, or alternatively painted over with dotted patterns.
This painting is a portrayal of Puntawarri, a now abandoned community in-between Jigalong and the Canning Stock Route. Puntawarri is on the middle stretches of the Canning Stock Route, near Well 17 also known as Durba Springs. This place is an important cultural area, east of the Jigalong Aboriginal Community, where the artist now lives with her family. The old people used to live here and work here. The road goes from Jigalong past Puntawarri and onto Pimpi, and then continues to the Canning Stock Route. There is a waterhole here where the old bush people used to go to in the pujiman (bush) days while they were still walking around that country.
“Punmu [community]- I went there when I was a young girl, a teenager with my mother and father before my mother passed. Big mob of people was there. No building, just little cubbie houses (bower shelters). Long time I been there.
These here are the waterholes around Punmu. In the middle is Rawa spring, Rawa means long time. On the right is Tuu Tuu, then Jila Jila, Wilarra and Yilyara up the top. That is my ngurra (home). We grew up in Punmu around all theses water holes. I still live here with my grand kids, same stories for all these places.”
Marianne and her sister were brought up by their father, Martumili Artist Pukina Burton (dec.) She and her father would sit down together to paint, and Pukina would tells stories about his Country. Marianne is now often found painting in Newman and Punmu with her grandchildren, passing down stories about Country and culture.
Punmu is a community that sits on the edge of an important warla (lake) known as Lake Dora. The lake runs South into the area known as Karlamilyi (Rudall River National Park). Rock holes, waterholes, soaks and springs were important sites for Martu people during the pujiman (traditional, bush-dwelling) era, with many important jukurrpa (dreaming stories) chronicling the creation of these landmarks.
““If they dig him up, anybody, blackfella, whitefellas they’ll get killed! Ngayurnangalku still there [in Kumpupirntily]. No people gotta go come to this place. If they go there it’s one way! There’s a cannibal there. Don’t come to this place- you might get killed! They gonna eat you for lunch! Don’t go, keep away!!
Some people paint a rockhole, only rockhole. Nothing. I got story. Jukurrpa. Full up….”
– Billy Yunkurra Atkins
This painting depicts Yunkurra’s Country; Kumpupirntily (Lake Disappointment) in the Canning Stock Route area. This large warla (salt lake) is one of the most sacred and dangerous sites in the far Western Desert. This is where the Ngayurnangalku (cannibal beings) live beneath the lake, surfacing only to feed on human flesh.
Depicted in this work are traditional types of bush tucker, their habitats, and their related hunting and gathering methods. During the pujiman (traditional, desert dwelling) period, Martu would traverse very large distances annually in small family groups, moving seasonally from water source to water source, and hunting and gathering bush tucker as they went. Whilst desert life has moved away from mobile hunter-gatherer subsistence throughout the course of the twentieth century, bush tucker continues to be a significant component of the modern Martu diet. Hunting and gathering bush tucker remains equally valuable as an important cultural practice that is passed on intergenerationally. Though hunting and gathering implements have been modernised, methods of harvesting, tracking and the use of fire burning to drive animals from their retreats are still commonly practiced today.
Typically, animals hunted for their kuwiyi (meat) include kirti-kirti (euro kangaroo) and marlu (plains kangaroo), parnajarrpa (sand goanna), kipara (Australian bustard, bush turkey) and karlaya (emu). Lunki (witchetty grub) and wuukurta (honey ants) are dug from tree and bush trunks, or from underground nests. Popular mayi (plant food) includes minyarra (bush onion), collected from small, grass like plants; root vegetables dug from underground such as kulyu and mata (types of bush potato); and seeds such as kalaru (samphire, salt bush), yuwinyji, and marnkalpa (spinifex species). Jawirli (quondong), wamurla (bush tomatoes), jinyjiwirrily (wild gooseberry), ngaputa (melon), and karlkula (bush banana) are some of the most popular bush fruits. These are often collected in the wantajarra (cool season) and tuulpara (spring) months, along with juri (sweet) botanical gums and wama (nectar), obtained from various plant species.
Traditional tools used for hunting and gathering bush tucker were carved from wanari (mulga), mulunturu (desert oak), yurungkura (river red gum) and mijarrpa (bloodwoods), and included kurlata (spears), jurna (hitting stick), karli (boomerangs), wana (digging-sticks), piti (timber bowls used for carrying food and water), and jiwa (grinding stones for grinding seeds into flour). While carved objects retain enormous social and ceremonial importance in Martu life, they are no longer used for hunting and gathering.