114182365702

Published by CompNet Systems on

Tjitji kutjarra – Two boys

This is the story of the two boys, though some say it was two brothers or a brother and sister, living around Mantamaru (Jameson). One day they saw the track of a big snake, they followed and eventually caught and ate. Unbeknownst, the brothers they had eaten a spirit or magical snake.

The next day the brothers felt unwell. Any task became hard and their walking slowed down. Gradually they became slower and slower until they reach the top of a hill where no longer able to move they turned to stone.  

Driving east from Jameson (on your left) you can see two lonely up-right rocks, one smaller than the other on the top of a hill which are called Tjitji (child) Kutjarra (two).

Categories: Papulankutja Artists

Name: Janet Nuyunkanya Lane

Language: Ngaanyatjarra

Community: Papulankutja (Blackstone)

Biography:

Janet has been creating paintings for Papulankutja Artists since its inception in 2003.  'These old people would paint and I would watch them and paint. I paint my own design, my own style.' She has also painted with Ninuku Arts centre that supports artists living in Pipalyatjara and Kalka in the APY Lands to the east of Papulankutja (Blackstone). 

Janet has one daughter and a granddaughter. She is also a tjanpi (grass) weaver and contributed to the following major projects.

In 2005 Papulankutja Tjanpi weavers won first prize in the National Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Art Award with their collaborative Tjanpi Grass Toyota sculpture. It was acquired by the Museum and Art Gallery NT as part of their permanent collection. This was the first time a contemporary fibre art piece took the major prize in the history of this prestigious award.

Songlines Exhibition - More recently she created a female sculptural figure – one of the Seven Sisters of the Tjukurrpa (ancestral creation stories) - for the extraordinary multi-faceted National Museum of Australia (NMA) Songlines exhibition that was on display at the NMA in Canberra from September 2017 to February 2018. The sculptures can see online as actual objects and have also been digitised as characters for a video.

The Tjanpi Desert Weavers created these sculptures with artists from Papulankutja, in the Blackstone Ranges between the Western and Great Victoria deserts. During a two-week camp at Kuru Ala, a remote Seven Sisters site in Western Australia, 14 tjanpi weavers wove the sisters into life. They then moved to a campsite just outside Papulankutja to finish the tjanpi sisters. Each figure was made by two artists. For many of the figures, a senior artist paired with a younger emerging artist so that the act of creation was also one of passing on skills to a future generation of tjanpi artists.

Related Posts

Papulankutja Artists

114182368280

Kungkarrangkalpa (Seven Sisters) ‘Kungkarrangkalpa’ (The Seven Sisters or Pleaides) is significant Tjukurrpa (dreamtime). Its origins you may be familiar with in astronomy and its connection to ‘Wati Nyiru’ (Magic Man or Orion).  The roots of Read more…

Papulankutja Artists

114182368279

Papulankutja Artists

114182368277

Tjitji kutjarra – Two boys This is the story of the two boys, though some say it was two brothers or a brother and sister, living around Mantamaru (Jameson). One day they saw the track of a Read more…

© the artist / art centre