CompNet Systems

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Kungka & Wati

When Doris speaks about her Kungka & Wati (woman & man) paintings, she interweaves two separate stories; a memory of her family, and a story of spirits, both travelling over country. The painting depicts both of these subjects.

In Doris’s words:

He comes like a ghost, a spirit, and becomes a human being, dancing, all the kungkas come.

They travel around country, West to North. Travel around places to where the water is, looking for the waterhole. They travel to another country.

My memory of family travelling around. A story of spirits travelling over the country.

I was sleeping and woke up and saw someone dancing.

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Karrinyarra

This painting depicts designs connected to the sacred site of Karrinyarra, to the north of Papunya. This is a Kapi Tjukurrpa (Water Dreaming) and Yalka Tjukurrpa (Bush Onion) place. This is a place where the women collect yalka. If present, concentric circles represent waterholes or yalka. Often women are depicted as U shapes, with their wana or digging stick and oval shaped coollamon by their side.Bush onions may be eaten raw or cooked after removing the hard casing. They are a small onion sedge with corms on shallow roots, the size of a small shallot. The women would perform a traditional ceremony in honour of the Bush Onion where they dance and paint their breast, chest and forearms in ceremonial body designs. They also decorate their bodies with feathers and dance with ceremonial objects such as nulla nullas (ceremonial dancing baton).

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Kalinykalinypa Tjukurrpa

Beyula is telling the story of the Kalinykalinypa or desert grevillea flower, a favourite bush food for Anangu people and quite a delicacy. Kalinykalinypa grows in the sandy soils on the plains. The beautiful orange coloured flowers are picked early in the morning and placed in a billycan of water to create ‘honeywater’ (cordial) or sucked straight off the branch for their sweet honey dew. More often than not Anangu move from flower to flower, bending the flowers towards them so they can suck the nectar rather than picking it.

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Kungka Tjukurrpa at Ilpilli

This painting represents the sacred site of Ilpilli, Napurrula’s country, which is located between Mt Liebig and Kintore. Karen’s ancestors (The Napurrula women) were travelling across land searching for water and came upon this site. They discovered rockholes with water and a creek, which meant there was plenty of food around. This became a significant place and they remained there for a long time. Eventually the missionaries came and took them to Haasts Bluff.

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Karrinyarra

This painting depicts designs connected to the sacred site of Karrinyarra, to the north of Papunya. This is a Kapi Tjukurrpa (Water Dreaming) and Yalka Tjukurrpa (Bush Onion) place. This is a place where the women collect yalka. If present, concentric circles represent waterholes or yalka. Often women are depicted as U shapes, with their wana or digging stick and oval shaped coollamon by their side.Bush onions may be eaten raw or cooked after removing the hard casing. They are a small onion sedge with corms on shallow roots, the size of a small shallot. The women would perform a traditional ceremony in honour of the Bush Onion where they dance and paint their breast, chest and forearms in ceremonial body designs. They also decorate their bodies with feathers and dance with ceremonial objects such as nulla nullas (ceremonial dancing baton).

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Kungka Tjukurrpa at Ilpilli

This painting represents the sacred site of Ilpilli, Napurrula’s country, which is located between Mt Liebig and Kintore.

Karen’s ancestors (The Napurrula women) were travelling across land searching for water and came upon this site. They discovered rockholes with water and a creek, which meant there was plenty of food around. This became a significant place and they remained there for a long time.

Eventually the missionaries came and took them to Haasts Bluff. 

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Kalipinypa

<p>This painting depicts the Kapi Tjukurrpa (Water Dreaming) at Kalipinypa, North-east of Kintore. The painting tells the story of the rain and hail making ceremony for the site of Kalipinypa. Ancestral forces are invoked to bring on a powerful storm with lightning, thunderclouds and rain sending a deluge to rejuvenate the earth, filling the rock holes, clay pans and creeks and creating new life and growth upon the land. Today the custodians of this important Water Dreaming site celebrate its stories in ceremonies.</p><p>

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Pilkati anta rumiya (Snake and goanna)

Snake this one, eating, here, at the water. This mob over there are stabbing it with a spear. He’s trying to bite and eat that one over there. And that over there is coming to look at him, that one. This one, he’s watching, he is, ‘ooohhh!’, sneaking up intending to bite it. That one over there …
he bit him, that goanna yep, this one.
Coming to here, coming through the bush to the water, ‘ooohhh!’, they see it! ‘What happened here?’
Over there, a goanna is coming along. Going, going into the bush, across the water, sneaking up to try and bite it.
Yeah, this one, two men standing, over there is another, there watching all this the snake,
see? And see this line … he’s slowly sneaking along it.

After that, that one over there stabs him with a spear, with a spear he stabbed. Went and got that goanna and ate it, over there came and see all this mob.
Yeah, finished like that, that’s how I made this one by the water.

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Pilkati anta rumiya (Snake and goanna)

Snake this one, eating, here, at the water. This mob over there are stabbing it with a spear. He’s trying to bite and eat that one over there. And that over there is coming to look at him, that one. This one, he’s watching, he is, ‘ooohhh!’, sneaking up intending to bite it. That one over there …
he bit him, that goanna yep, this one.
Coming to here, coming through the bush to the water, ‘ooohhh!’, they see it! ‘What happened here?’
Over there, a goanna is coming along. Going, going into the bush, across the water, sneaking up to try and bite it.
Yeah, this one, two men standing, over there is another, there watching all this the snake,
see? And see this line … he’s slowly sneaking along it.

After that, that one over there stabs him with a spear, with a spear he stabbed. Went and got that goanna and ate it, over there came and see all this mob.

Yeah, finished like that, that’s how I made this one by the water.

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Kungka & Wati

When Doris speaks about her Kungka & Wati (woman & man) paintings, she interweaves two separate stories; a memory of her family, and a story of spirits, both travelling over country. The painting depicts both of these subjects.

In Doris’s words:

He comes like a ghost, a spirit, and becomes a human being, dancing, all the kungkas come.

They travel around country, West to North. Travel around places to where the water is, looking for the waterhole. They travel to another country.

My memory of family travelling around. A story of spirits travelling over the country.

I was sleeping and woke up and saw someone dancing.