November 2023

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Seasons

“My paintings are all about the seasons. The Country is always changing. One day you might see one kind of flower and the next day they are gone; they have given way to a new kind of flower. 

I see the Country in a different way. In my paintings I am looking at the Country with a birds eye view, the way you see the land when you’re in a plane.”

– Derrick Butt 

 

This work portrays an area of Derrick’s ngurra (home Country, camp) represented aerially. 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. 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 in paintings with the 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 as described by Derrick; life cycles based around kalyu (rain, water) and waru (fire).

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Bush tucker and wild flower

“I make a painting and it’s a wild bush flower, desert flower! And bush tucker. I do painting for bush tucker and wild flower.”

– Danita Wise

Depicted in this work are traditional types of bush tucker, their floral 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.

Over half a million square kilometres of mangroves, off shore islands, deep gorges, mountain ranges, desert sand dunes and river pools ensure the Pilbara’s flora is as diverse as the landscape. Plants and flowers in the Pilbara have evolved unique adaptations to survive in an arid climate that receives most of its rainfall during summer by way of tropical cyclones. Watercourses are lined with river red gums, coolibah, silver cadjeput and desert bloodwood trees. Gorges contain permanent water supplies to support moisture loving plants like the common rock fig and rock kurrajong. From July to September wildflowers of all colours, sizes and shapes, like the unmistakeable Sturt’s desert pea, fluffy mulla mulla, the tall majestic Ashburton pea or any number of the 65 species of Acacia (wattle) can be seen throughout the region.

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Parnngurr area

Parnngurr is an Aboriginal community located 370km east of Newman, at the Southern end of the Karlamilyi (Rudall River) area, and in the Pilbara region of Western Australia. Created during the return to Country movement of the 1980s, with the recognition of Aboriginal land rights and native title, the community was named after its’ original primary water source, a nearby rockhole and yinta (permanent spring). Until recently the community was widely known as Cotton Creek, after the European name for the ephemeral creek running alongside the community. Parnngurr and its surrounds are physically dominated by distinctively red tali (sandhills), covered sparingly with spinifex and low lying shrub.

Historically Parnngurr Rockhole was an important site for Aboriginal people during the pujiman (traditional, desert born) era. During this nomadic period families stopped and camped here depending on the seasonal availability of water and the corresponding cycles of plant and animal life on which hunting and gathering bush tucker was reliant. At Parnngurr and other similarly important camp sites, families would meet for a time before moving to their next destination. 

Parnngurr is also a site chronicled in the epic Jukurrpa (Dreaming) story of the Minyipuru (Jakulyukulyu, Seven Sisters), as they flee from the lustful old man, Yurla. The sisters stopped to rest on Parnngurr Hill before continuing on their long journey east. Minyipuru is a central Jukurrpa narrative for Martu, Ngaanyatjarra, Pitjantjatjara and Yankunytjatjara people that is associated with the seasonal Pleiades star constellation. Relayed in song, dance, stories and paintings, Minyipuru serves as a creation narrative, a source of information relating to the physical properties of the land, and an embodiment of Aboriginal cultural laws. Beginning in Roebourne on the west coast of Western Australia, the story morphs in its movement eastward across the land, following the women as they walk, dance, and even fly from waterhole to waterhole. As they travel the women camp, sing, wash, dance and gather food, leaving markers in the landscape and creating landforms that remain to this day, such as groupings of rocks and trees, grinding stones and seeds. During the entirety of their journey the women are pursued by a lustful old man, Yurla, although interactions with other animals, groups of men, and spirit beings are also chronicled in the narrative.

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Kaalpa – Kartarru – Wantili

“This is my Grandmother’s [Bugai Whyoulter’s] Country, my Country. Wantili (Warntili, Canning Stock Route Well 25) is old Law Grounds from Dreaming days and very important to Martu people. My grandmother always tells me about Wantili because she grew up around Wantili. It is close to her birthplace and is her ngurra (home Country, camp). She was a young girl walking around at Wantili. Her family would travel between Wantili, Kaalpa, Juntu-juntu, Raarki, and Wuranu Wells along the Canning Stock Route. Big mob of people they been walking around there. She saw whitefellas there for the first time, Canning mob when they were traveling up and down the stock route with the bullock. They were running away from those whitefellas, watching them from a distance. She was a teenager when she was travelling around there with her four mothers and one daddy. They used to travel around in family groups, Bugai and Jakayu [Biljabu], and Jakayu’s nyupa (partner) Phillip Biljabu. They met Kumpaya [Girgirba] coming from Kun Kun (Kuny-Kuny), Kunawarritji area. Bugai returned to the Wantili area as a young woman, when she worked driving cattle along the Stock Route. 

Wantili is good for painting and telling stories. Our stories are still strong. I wanted to take Bugai back to Wantili. It is an important place; she hadn’t been there for a long time. My nana [Pinyirr] Nancy took me there as a young boy. Bugai is the older sister of Nancy. I been… three times going there. It’s important that place, out a long way from Newman… Those old people like going to Wantili, where the creation started. Jakayu and Kumpaya… them two aunties told me a story about Dreamtime, and how important Wantili was. People from different tribes…from all over the place could come there for the initiation ceremony. The Jukurrpa (Dreaming) stories from Wantili are just for Martu but the site is open, and anyone can go there. 

It’s a lovely part of the Country to take the kids for a swim. The place has changed. The water used to be muddy like chocolate, now the water is clear. Maybe from climate change, maybe from mining, maybe from something else. The changes don’t have to be bad; the landscape is always changing, same way as Martu people. It’s good to make work sitting out in Country, but I can make these paintings anywhere, just like those old people. Wherever I am, painting Country takes me back there in my head, back to Jukurrpa times, back to pujiman (traditional, desert dwelling) days when my grandmother walked around there, and back to days going there for a swim as a kid. I hope this painting carries people there too. I’m proud to be able to share my culture and stories with younger Martu people and whitefellas.”

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Linyji (claypan)

This work depicts a linyji (claypan) within the artists’ ngurra (home Country, camp), typically represented with circular forms. Claypans were visited more often during the wet seasons as they filled with water. 

During the pujiman (traditional, desert dwelling) period, knowledge of water sources was critical for survival, and today Martu Country is still defined in terms of the location and type of water. Each of the hundreds of claypans, rockholes, waterholes, soaks and springs found in the Martu desert homelands is known through real life experience and the recounting of Jukurrpa (Dreaming) narratives by name, location, quality and seasonal availability. This encyclopedic knowledge extends even to the nature and movement of arterial waterways, and 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.

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All the Martu communities

“This is my Grandmother’s [Bugai Whyoulter’s] Country, my Country. Wantili (Warntili, Canning Stock Route Well 25) is old Law Grounds from Dreaming days and very important to Martu people. My grandmother always tells me about Wantili because she grew up around Wantili. It is close to her birthplace and is her ngurra (home Country, camp). She was a young girl walking around at Wantili. Her family would travel between Wantili, Kaalpa, Juntu-juntu, Raarki, and Wuranu Wells along the Canning Stock Route. Big mob of people they been walking around there. She saw whitefellas there for the first time, Canning mob when they were traveling up and down the stock route with the bullock. They were running away from those whitefellas, watching them from a distance. She was a teenager when she was travelling around there with her four mothers and one daddy. They used to travel around in family groups, Bugai and Jakayu [Biljabu], and Jakayu’s nyupa (partner) Phillip Biljabu. They met Kumpaya [Girgirba] coming from Kun Kun (Kuny-Kuny), Kunawarritji area. Bugai returned to the Wantili area as a young woman, when she worked driving cattle along the Stock Route. 

Wantili is good for painting and telling stories. Our stories are still strong. I wanted to take Bugai back to Wantili. It is an important place; she hadn’t been there for a long time. My nana [Pinyirr] Nancy took me there as a young boy. Bugai is the older sister of Nancy. I been… three times going there. It’s important that place, out a long way from Newman… Those old people like going to Wantili, where the creation started. Jakayu and Kumpaya… them two aunties told me a story about Dreamtime, and how important Wantili was. People from different tribes…from all over the place could come there for the initiation ceremony. The Jukurrpa (Dreaming) stories from Wantili are just for Martu but the site is open, and anyone can go there. 

It’s a lovely part of the Country to take the kids for a swim. The place has changed. The water used to be muddy like chocolate, now the water is clear. Maybe from climate change, maybe from mining, maybe from something else. The changes don’t have to be bad; the landscape is always changing, same way as Martu people. It’s good to make work sitting out in Country, but I can make these paintings anywhere, just like those old people. Wherever I am, painting Country takes me back there in my head, back to Jukurrpa times, back to pujiman (traditional, desert dwelling) days when my grandmother walked around there, and back to days going there for a swim as a kid. I hope this painting carries people there too. I’m proud to be able to share my culture and stories with younger Martu people and whitefellas.”

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Wantili (Warntili, Canning Stock Route Well 25)

“This is my Grandmother’s [Bugai Whyoulter’s] Country, my Country. Wantili (Warntili, Canning Stock Route Well 25) is old Law Grounds from Dreaming days and very important to Martu people. My grandmother always tells me about Wantili because she grew up around Wantili. It is close to her birthplace and is her ngurra (home Country, camp). She was a young girl walking around at Wantili. Her family would travel between Wantili, Kaalpa, Juntu-juntu, Raarki, and Wuranu Wells along the Canning Stock Route. Big mob of people they been walking around there. She saw whitefellas there for the first time, Canning mob when they were traveling up and down the stock route with the bullock. They were running away from those whitefellas, watching them from a distance. She was a teenager when she was travelling around there with her four mothers and one daddy. They used to travel around in family groups, Bugai and Jakayu [Biljabu], and Jakayu’s nyupa (partner) Phillip Biljabu. They met Kumpaya [Girgirba] coming from Kun Kun (Kuny-Kuny), Kunawarritji area. Bugai returned to the Wantili area as a young woman, when she worked driving cattle along the Stock Route. 

Wantili is good for painting and telling stories. Our stories are still strong. I wanted to take Bugai back to Wantili. It is an important place; she hadn’t been there for a long time. My nana [Pinyirr] Nancy took me there as a young boy. Bugai is the older sister of Nancy. I been… three times going there. It’s important that place, out a long way from Newman… Those old people like going to Wantili, where the creation started. Jakayu and Kumpaya… them two aunties told me a story about Dreamtime, and how important Wantili was. People from different tribes…from all over the place could come there for the initiation ceremony. The Jukurrpa (Dreaming) stories from Wantili are just for Martu but the site is open, and anyone can go there. 

It’s a lovely part of the Country to take the kids for a swim. The place has changed. The water used to be muddy like chocolate, now the water is clear. Maybe from climate change, maybe from mining, maybe from something else. The changes don’t have to be bad; the landscape is always changing, same way as Martu people. It’s good to make work sitting out in Country, but I can make these paintings anywhere, just like those old people. Wherever I am, painting Country takes me back there in my head, back to Jukurrpa times, back to pujiman (traditional, desert dwelling) days when my grandmother walked around there, and back to days going there for a swim as a kid. I hope this painting carries people there too. I’m proud to be able to share my culture and stories with younger Martu people and whitefellas.”