UNTITLED (TINGARI AT KAAKURATINTJA), 2005
GEORGE WARD TJUNGURRAYI
synthetic polymer paint on linen
213.5 x 280.0 cm
bears inscription verso: artist's name, size and Papunya Tula Artists cat. GW0501225
Papunya Tula Artists, Alice Springs, Northern Territory
Charles Perkins Children's Trust - Pool Party Auction, Art Gallery of New South Wales, 3 November 2005, Sydney, lot 30
Private collection, Sydney, acquired from the above
Pool Party Art Auction catalogue, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 2005, cat. 30, n.p. (illus.)
As a youth, George Ward Tjungurrayi, was taken to Papunya from his homelands west of Lake Macdonald in 1963 along with his family as part of Jeremy Long’s Welfare Branch patrols. Born in bush near Lararra (east of Tjukurla) Western Australia in 1947, his formative years were spent in the desert with his older half bothers Yala Yala Gibbs Tjungurrayi (a founding member of the Papunya Art movement in the early 1970s) and Willy Tjungurrayi, also a prominent artist. At Papunya, George worked as a fencer and butcher in the community kitchen. He married Nangawarre Ward Napurrula, and they had two children, moving to various Western Australian communities before staying for a few years from 1981 in the newly established Pintupi community of Kintore, just over the Northern Territory border and closer to his traditional homelands. There George was inspired by the art of his brothers who had become two of Papunya Tula’s leading artists. George and family moved further west to the new settlement of Kiwirrkurra in Western Australian and it was here that he officially began painting with Papunya Tula Artists. Characterised by shifting forms and mesmerising surfaces, the paintings of Geroge were soon coveted with his first exhibition was held in 1990. George progressed to become one of Papunya Tula’s leading artists and his work has since been shown in several group and solo shows throughout Australia and abroad.
Significantly, Untitled (Tingari at Kaakuratintja), 2005 was commissioned by Papunya Tula Artists and donated to the ‘Pool Party’ fundraising auction held at the Art Gallery of New South Wales in November 2005. A mesmerising and arresting work, it offers a monumental example of the artist’s multi layered compositions. ‘Depicting the site of Karrkurritinytja (the large salt-lake of Lake MacDonald) where in mythological times a large group of Tingari ancestors travelled to this site from Kulkuta, southwest of the Tjukula community in Western Australia. After visiting the site of Nyumpu, the men continued east to Karrkurritinytja. However, when they arrived, they were attacked by a huge snake which came out of a deep hole. The men fought the snake but were eventually killed by it.’1
1. See artwork catalogue entry in Pool Party Art Auction Catalogue, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 2005, p. 19
CRISPIN GUTTERIDGE