Artiste : Kanta Donnegan

Titre de l'œuvre : Minyma Tjuta

Format : 200 x 137 cm

Provenance et certificat : centre d'art aborigène du Spinifex Art Project

Référence de cette peinture : 19-12

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Explications pour cette œuvre :

Kanta (1944) was born around the 1940's at a place called Kapi Piti Kutjara. Kanta, a senior Spinifex woman is knowledgeable about many areas in Spinifex country including the Minyma Tjuta (Seven Sisters) Tjukurpa, a central theme in the lives of Western Desert women. In this story seven women, all sisters are travelling through the country on a vast journey which takes them from Coolgardie right across the desert to Port Augusta in SA. Along the way the sisters are being pursued by Wati Nyiru, the cheeky old man in pursuit of a wife, preferably the oldest sister, Kampukurtja. During his pursuit, Nyiru disguises himself in various ways to trick the sisters but is eventually outsmarted by them. The women fly up into the sky to form the constellation of Pleiades seen in the southern sky.

Kanta was born circa 1944 in the gentle sand plain country of southern Spinifex between the Tjuntun and Unpun rock holes. The ubiquitous men’s tjukurpa, Wati Kutjara (Two Men) courses through the middle of Kanta's country on its way east to S.A. where it acts as the lynch pin for two other men’s tjukurpa heading to a common destination at Kaliwani (Lake Maurice).

Kanta went into Cundeelee Mission in the late 1950s sweep a young married woman without children. Kanta had one son and three daughters by her first husband (dec.) in Cundeelee and returned to Spinifex in the first wave of resettlers in 1984. Apart from attending the odd exhibition or women’s trip to the outside Kanta has not left the desert lands since. Several years after the Rictor family came in from northern Spinifex she married one of the sons, Ian - her kuri pikitja, often translated as “promised one”. As if forged by the early years in her country Kanta is gentle soul and has assiduously painted with the Spinifex Art Project since representing her country in the women’s native title painting in 1997. Kathleen has painted on most of the women’s collaboratives.

Her artworks are in the following prestigious collections :

Collection Prince Stefan Of Liechtenstein, Embassy Of Liechtenstein In Germany.(Womens Collaborate)
Museum Of Western Australia
The Corrigan Collection, Australia. (Womens Collaborative)
The Lepley Collection, Perth, Western Australia. (Womens Collaborative)
The National Gallery Of Victoria, Melbourne, Vic. (Womens Collaborative)
The Sims Dickson Collection, Nsw (Collaborative With Ngalpingka Simms)
Artbank, Australian Government Collection. Australia.
Parliament House Art Collection, Canberra, Act (Womens Collaborative)
Art Gallery Of South Australia, Adelaide, South Australia (Womens Collaborative)