CompNet Systems

Doris Bush- Pilkati, wilinyi & Tjurrpinyi at ikuntji. (Snake, hunting & swimming at Haasts Bluff.)

This is a memory from Doris’s past. Doris talks of the times when she was a young girl in the bush, swimming and hunting with her friends at Ikuntji (Haasts Bluff). She talks of sand hills where the young people would wander naked looking for water, “chasing” the water until they found a water hole. The young men and women would swim together and make love by the water hole. Eventually, Doris explains, the young people fall in love and are married.

Doris is remembering the traditional tools and weapons that were used by her and her friends in the bush. Doris depicts Kali (boomerang), wana (digging stick), puli (grinding stone), kutitji (shield), kulata (spear) and kantikanti (hitting stick).

“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.”

Doris Bush Papa Tjukurrpa – Nyumannu

Nyunmanu is a Dingo Dreaming site just to the south east of the remote Aboriginal community of Kintore in the Northern Territory. Most of the dingoes and their pups from this place rose up into the sky and became stars. However, the ancestral mother Dingo and her pup had gone out hunting and were too tired to rise up, so they turned into a large rock that marks the place of this sacred Dreaming. 

It is said that if you sleep in this place you will dream of the ancestral dingo puppies. The story goes that if you remove one of the gleaming stones found at Nyunmanu, the puppies will haunt your dreams until you return it to the place where it belongs. The custodians of this Tjukurrpa are Nungarrayi, Tjungarrayi, Napaltjarri and Tjapaltjarri women and men.

The circles in this story often represent important waterholes. The roundels extending from the circles are the designs the women paint on their breasts during ceremony.

Maureen Poulson Kapi Tjukurrpa – Kalipinypa

The painting depicts designs associated with Kapi Tjukurrpa (Water Dreaming) at Kalipinypa, a site northwest of Kintore. The tjukurrpa tells of an important rain making ceremony to invoke the elements. It is a powerful storm bringing on the lightning, thunderclouds and rain sending its deluge to rejuvenate the earth, filling rock holes, clay pans and creeks. It has the power to create new life and growth upon the land.

Four Dreamings – Carbiene McDonald

In this work Carbiene depicts four dreaming stories which he inherited from his father. These tjukurrpa are associated with a series of waterholes running between Docker River and Kata Tjuta. Specifically, it includes four important sites: Petermann Ranges, Docker River, Kalaya Murrpu (Blood’s Range) and Mulyayti near Kata Tjuta. 

As a young man, Carbiene returned to these places and retraced the footsteps of his father. These memories stay with him vividly today. 

Candy Nakamarra Kalipinypa

The painting depicts designs associated with Kapi Tjukurrpa (Water Dreaming) at Kalipinypa a site northwest of Sandy Blight Junction, Western Australia.The Tjukurrpa tells of an important rain making ceremony to invoke the elements. It is a powerful storm bringing on the lightning, thunderclouds and rain sending its deluge to rejuvenate the earth, filling rock holes, clay pans and creeks. It has the power to create new life and growth upon the land. The different elements of the image represent puuli (hills), tali (sandhills) and kapi (water). Plants and leaves spring up after the heavy rain, nourishing the land and the people. The concentric circles represent waterholes, while the arrow shapes represent the footprints of the white heron that frequents the site.

Doris Bush – Papa Tjukurrpa – Nyumannu Memory

Doris Bush – Pilkati

Doris Bush – Pilkati This is Doris’s Mothers Story. The custodians of this story are the Tjapaltjarri, Napaltjarri, Tjakamarra and Nakamarra skin groups. The kutuguro or policeman of this story are the Tjupurrula and Naparulla skin groups. There was a pregnant snake that travelled from Hassts Bluff looking for a place to give birth. It travelled through Karinyarra to Kalipinypa where it fought with an aggressive snake. It decided that Kalipinypa was not a good place to give birth because of that cheeky snake, so it travelled thorough Newmanu back to Hassts bluff. This is where the snake gave birth. This is the reason that Doris’s mother, when pregnant with Doris decided to come back to Hassts bluff to gave birth to her. The circles in the painting represent the Kapi Tjukutji (water holes) at Ikuntji (Hassts Bluff) where Doris grew up.

Doris Bush- Bush Mangarri Tjuta & Pilkati anta rumiya. (All the bush food and the snake and goanna.)

Doris Bush- 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.