November 2022

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“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.

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This is Mayiwalku’s Country- her ‘ngurra’ (home Country, camp). People identify with their ngurra in terms of specific rights and responsibilities, and the possession of intimate knowledge of the physical and cultural properties of one’s Country. Painting ngurra, and in so doing sharing the Jukurrpa (Dreaming) stories and physical characteristics of that place, has today become an important means of cultural maintenance. 

Mayiwalku’s ngurra encompasses the Country that she and her family walked in the pujiman (traditional, desert-dwelling) era. Mayiwalku was born at Yirnangarri. She grew up, walked and hunted primarily around the Country extending across the Punmu, Kunawarritji (Canning Stock Route Well 33) and Karlamilyi (Rudall River) regions. Following the death of both their parents, Mayiwalku and her sisters travelled alone between Punmu and Kunawarritji, occasionally meeting with other family groups. They continued to live nomadically before eventually deciding to move to Jigalong Mission along with many other relatives following an extreme and prolonged drought in the 1960s. 

Portrayed in this work are features of Mayiwalku’s ngurra, such as the dominant permanent red tali (sandhills), warta (trees, vegetation), and the individually named water sources she and her family camped at. These include Januwa, Jilankujarra, Karlajarntu, Kartungu, Kularti, Kumpupajanu, Kunalimpi, Kunarra, Marnakarti, Pangkapirni, Wilunganinya, Wurur-wururna, Yilyara, and Yirrajarra Rock holes, waterholes, soaks and springs were all extremely important sites for Martu people during the pujiman period, and are generally depicted with circular forms. 

The encyclopaedic knowledge of the location, quality and seasonal availability of the hundreds of water bodies found in one’s Country sustained Martu as they travelled across their Country, hunting and gathering, visiting family, and fulfilling ceremonial obligations. They would traverse very large distances annually, visiting specific areas in the dry and wet season depending on the availability of water and the corresponding cycles of plant and animal life on which hunting and gathering bush tucker was reliant. As they travelled and hunted they would also burn areas of Country, generating a greater diversity of plant and animal life.

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Kulyakartu

Kulyakartu is a large area in the far north of the Martu homelands, near the Percival Lakes region of Western Australia’s Great Sandy Desert. Kulyakartu is mostly flat grass Country, and is known as a good hunting area. In particular, parnajarrpa (goanna), wild cats, and lunki (witchetty grub) are found in abundance here. In the wantajarra (wet season) the dry lakes in the region fill with water.

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This is Yikartu’s Country- her ‘ngurra’ (home Country, camp). People identify with their ngurra in terms of specific rights and responsibilities, and the possession of intimate knowledge of the physical and cultural properties of one’s Country. Painting ngurra, and in so doing sharing the Jukurrpa (Dreaming) stories and physical characteristics of that place, has today become an important means of cultural maintenance. 

Yikartu’s ngurra encompasses the Country that she and her family walked in the pujiman (traditional, desert-dwelling) era. Yikartu was born at Lalyipuka. She grew up, walked and hunted primarily within Yulparija Country, north of Manyjilyjarra Country, and through to the Percival Lakes area, at the northern boundary of the Martu homelands. She continued to live nomadically before eventually deciding to move to Jigalong Mission along with many other relatives following an extreme and prolonged drought in the 1960s. 

Portrayed in this work are features of Yikartu’s ngurra, such as the dominant permanent red tali (sandhills), warta (trees, vegetation), and the individually named water sources she and her family camped at. These include Yulpu, Yimiri, Kupankurlu, Kurturrara, Wirnpa, Jurnpanja, Rulu-rulu, Taparl-taparl, Wirrkujapayi, Tayiku and Puntita. Rock holes, waterholes, soaks and springs were all extremely important sites for Martu people during the pujiman period, and are generally depicted with circular forms. 

The encyclopaedic knowledge of the location, quality and seasonal availability of the hundreds of water bodies found in one’s Country sustained Martu as they travelled across their Country, hunting and gathering, visiting family, and fulfilling ceremonial obligations. They would traverse very large distances annually, visiting specific areas in the dry and wet season depending on the availability of water and the corresponding cycles of plant and animal life on which hunting and gathering bush tucker was reliant. As they travelled and hunted they would also burn areas of Country, generating a greater diversity of plant and animal life.

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Puntawarri

“We drink water at Puntawarri. We clean and dig that waterhole. This Country is Puntawarri. My nanna, Dadda, taught me to paint this Country. Puntawarri is important because it is my pop’s, my nannas’ husband’s, place. They camped there and went hunting for goanna or anything, kangaroo or turkey. At Puntawarri there are all the waterholes. Good hunting this Country. There is still some Rabbit Proof Fence there.”

 – Judith Anya Samson

Puntawarri is an important cultural area located on the middle stretches of the Canning Stock Route and east of the Jigalong Mission (now Jigalong Aboriginal community), where Judith grew up with her grandmother and renowned Martumili Artist, Dadda Samson (dec.). Puntawarri is also the site of an abandoned community, a waterhole, creek and lake. Puntawarri’s close proximity to Jigalong Mission made it a popular site for Martu to visit during the ‘mission days’.

While growing up at Jigalong Mission in the 1960’s, Dadda would return to Puntawarri every weekend to hunt and camp. Dadda has been teaching Judith to paint for a number of years, sharing the knowledge and Jukurrpa (Dreaming) stories associated with her ngurra (home Country, camp). 

For many Martu, like Dadda and her family, Jigalong Mission was the site where their pujiman (traditional, desert dwelling) lifestyle came to an end from the late 1940s as they transitioned to a life as stockmen and women working in cattle stations in the Pilbara region and beyond. In the wake of the extreme and prolonged drought of the 1960s, the last of the remaining pujimanpa (desert dwellers) were forced to move to missions like Jigalong, where a supply of food and water was assured. There, many Martu were reunited with family members that had already moved in from the desert.

The waterhole at Puntawarri is said to be populated by several kinds of ancestral jila (snake), however the site is best known for its association with the Ngayurnangalku, fearsome ancestral cannibal beings. During the Jukurrpa the Ngayurnangalku came together from all over the desert, first stopping near Puntawarri on their travels to Kumpupirntily (Kumpupintily, Lake Disappointment). At Kumpupirntily, they had a big meeting to debate whether or not they would continue to live as cannibals, and eventually came to the decision to stop eating people. That night, a female baby cannibal was born to the eastern Ngayurnangalku on the red sandhills at Puntawarri, where she continues to live today as the ‘big mummy’ Ngayurnangalku. Following protocol, the baby also had to be consulted by the group. She determined that the Ngayurnangalku should continue to eat people. Her decision divided the group, and from this point the group from the east continued to live as ‘bad’ cannibals at Kumpupirntily, while the group from the west became ‘good’, thereafter consuming only animals.

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Bush Medicine

“I used to walk around Patjarr with my grandmother collecting bush medicine.  We would grab the leaves, the roots, make a fire and boil it up in a big pot.  Then we would put it in a little container, you rub it on when you are sick.  Helps with boils, scabies, wounds, cold sick.  Good for everything, you can drink it too. This one is called Warlparriny.”

 – Mary Larry 

Traditional Martu knowledge of plant properties was encyclopedic, and saw plants used for purposes as diverse as food resources, carving implements, tobacco, firewood, shelter construction, and bush medicines. Depicted in this work are types of bush medicines, their habitats, and the processes used in their preparation. 

Physical ailments treated with plant based poltices, body washes, drinks, rubs and pastes included fever, congestion, headache, skin sores, aching limbs, and digestive problems. More serious health issues were often treated with a combination of bush medicine and maparn (magic healing/ healer).

Plants still prepared to make bush medicines today include warlji (desert bloodwood), kalpari (Dysphania Kalpari) and nayju (green crumbweed), which can be soaked in a water solution to make a skin wash. One of the most popular types of bush medicine still used today is wanta (red sap), collected from the mijarrpa (bloodwood) tree and brewed as a tea to ease heart pains and other body aches.

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Spears and boomerang

Martu have been carving objects out of wood for as long as they have carved a life out of the desert. Kurlata (spears), woomera (spear throwers), pilpin (clubs), jurna (hitting sticks), jara (shields), karli (boomerangs), wana (digging-sticks), and piti (timber bowls used for carrying food and water) were the principal technologies of survival in the desert ecology. These tools were typically carved from wanari (mulga), mulunturu (desert oak), yurungkura (river red gum) and mijarrpa (bloodwoods). 

As the economic grounds of desert life shifted throughout the course of the twentieth century, from mobile hunter-gatherer subsistence to an equally mobile (but materially transformed) life on communities, in houses, with stores for food, so did the function of some of those technologies in desert life. While carved objects retain enormous social and ceremonial importance in Martu life, they are no longer used for hunting and gathering. Subsequently, the need to produce these objects to serve their original functions has diminished. However, the capacity and desire to produce them, to redefine them in new contexts, continues among desert artisans. Produced today as sculptural forms, they remain, as ever, an integral part of the evolving Martu cultural economy.

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Pirrkili

Pirrkili is a rockhole surrounded in all directions by permanent tali (sandhills), located east of Nyayartakujarra (Lake Dora) and south of Punmu Aboriginal community. Linyji (claypans) such as Pirrkili were traditionally visited more often during the wantajarra (wet season) when they were filled with water. 

This site lies within Nyanjilpayi’s ngurra (home Country, camp) through her uncle and grandmother, and forms part of the area which she knew intimately and travelled extensively in her youth. The Western Desert term ‘ngurra’ is hugely versatile in application. Broadly denoting birthplace and belonging, ngurra can refer to a body of water, a camp site, a large area of Country, or even a modern house. People identify with their ngurra in terms of specific rights and responsibilities, and the possession of intimate knowledge of the physical and cultural properties of one’s Country. This knowledge is traditionally passed intergenerationally through family connections. Painting ngurra, and in so doing sharing the Jukurrpa (Dreaming) stories and physical characteristics of that place, has today become an important means of cultural maintenance. Physical maintenance of one’s ngurra, like cultural maintenance, ensures a site’s wellbeing, and is a responsibility of the people belonging to that area.

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yaralalu

“This is my Country. My little brother was born here in pujiman (traditional, desert-dwelling) times. I was a big girl, no man yet. We were walking a long way.”

– Nyanjilpayi (Ngarnjapayi) Nancy Chapman

 

“When I was born my spirit appeared at Jarntinti. That’s my Country, Jarntinti. I was born a pujiman in Tarl Country. I know all about it, about that water over there, about my home, our grandparent’s Country. We travelled all around as pujiman, camping and then setting off again by foot. We didn’t get tired. We just kept on going. Sometimes it would rain, so we would build a shelter, just like a tent. Inside we would light a fire. Our pujiman lifestyle was very healthy and we didn’t get sick very often. Even when it was cold we continued to walk around in good health. Living on our Country we feel fulfilled. We know how to live here because we are pujiman.

I feel deeply satisfied, really well. It’s really good. I’m working on my painting of those waterholes, I was drinking from them long ago as a pujiman. My family’s water, my grandmother’s, my grandfathers and my ancestors. I was taught from them. Our knowledge is ancient and has been passed on by our grandparents. Young people need to keep looking after it. Our home is where our ancestors walked around. They knew how to care for it. Now we are teaching the younger generation. Now they have the knowledge of the water places. We are telling them they need to keep visiting these water places that we have taken them to and shown them properly. They need to keep visiting them after we have passed away. They need to continue our legacy and look after our Country, our grandparent’s Country.

– Nyanjilpayi Nancy Chapman, as translated by Kanyirninpa Jukurrpa

 

This is Nyanjilpayi’s Country- her ‘ngurra’ (home Country, camp). People identify with their ngurra in terms of specific rights and responsibilities, and the possession of intimate knowledge of the physical and cultural properties of one’s Country. Painting ngurra, and in so doing sharing the Jukurrpa (Dreaming) stories and physical characteristics of that place, has today become an important means of cultural maintenance. 

Nyanjilpayi’s ngurra encompasses the Country that she and her family walked in the pujiman  era. Nyanjilpayi was born at Jarntinti, a large claypan at the southern end of Nyayartakujarra (Lake Dora) and within the Karlamilyi (Rudall River) region. She grew up, walked and hunted primarily around the Country extending across the Punmu, Kunawarritji (Canning Stock Route Well 33) and Karlamilyi (Rudall River) regions. Following the death of both their parents, Nyanjilpayi and her sisters travelled alone between Punmu and Kunawarritji, occasionally meeting with other family groups. They continued to live nomadically before eventually deciding to move to Jigalong Mission along with many other relatives following an extreme and prolonged drought in the 1960s. 

Portrayed in this work are features of Nyanjilpayi’s ngurra, such as the dominant permanent red tali (sandhills), warta (trees, vegetation), and the individually named water sources she and her family camped at. These include Jarntinti, Yaralalu, Januwa, Jilankujarra, Karlajarntu, Kartungu, Kularti, Kumpupajanu, Kunalimpi, Kunarra, Marnakarti, Pangkapirni, Wilunganinya, Wurur-wururna, Yilyara, and Yirrajarra. Rock holes, waterholes, soaks and springs were all extremely important sites for Martu people during the pujiman period, and are generally depicted with circular forms.  

The encyclopaedic knowledge of the location, quality and seasonal availability of the hundreds of water bodies found in one’s Country sustained Martu as they travelled across their Country, hunting and gathering, visiting family, and fulfilling ceremonial obligations. They would traverse very large distances annually, visiting specific areas in the dry and wet season depending on the availability of water and the corresponding cycles of plant and animal life on which hunting and gathering bush tucker was reliant. As they travelled and hunted they would also burn areas of Country, generating a greater diversity of plant and animal life.

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Kulyakartu

Kulyakartu is a large area in the far north of the Martu homelands, near the Percival Lakes region of Western Australia’s Great Sandy Desert. Kulyakartu is mostly flat grass Country, and is known as a good hunting area. In particular, parnajarrpa (goanna), wild cats, and lunki (witchetty grub) are found in abundance here. In the wantajarra (wet season) the dry lakes in the region fill with water.