Artiste : Tjaruwa Woods

Titre de l'œuvre : Nguraku

Format : 75 x 60 cm

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

Référence de cette peinture : 17-86

Vendue

Explications pour cette œuvre :

Tjaruwa (1954) has painted her homelands, an area to the north of the Spinifex lands where she grew up. Born at Warutjara, Tjaruwa lived in Spinifex Country with a small family group away from any other group until 1986, when relatives from Tjuntjuntjara decided to “bring them in.” She is a skilled and knowledgable bushwoman and has become an increasingly sought after artist.

In this painting Tjaruwa specifically mentions the sites of Yampil,Tjutatjipi, Wyara, Tjapin, Kamanti and Pirulungka. These are places Tjaruwa travelled around as a young girl with her family. She now lives at Tjuntjuntjara.

Tjauruwa was born in 1954 outside the Spinifex Determination Area at Warutjara, the place of Minyma Tjilkamata - the Echidna Woman, near the current community of Jamieson (Manta Maru) within the Ngaanyatjarra Lands. Except for possession of a few pieces of iron, fashioned into implements and tin bowls Tjaruwa lived traditionally until the winter of 1986 when her family group of seven was located in northern Spinifex by a group of Spinifex people making a sortie into country to re-visit important Men’s sites after some 25 years of absence. Tjaruwa came in with a small son on her hip and camped with her family firstly at Yakatunya, 90 kilometres south of Tjuntjuntjara, joined the moving camp which accompanied the construction of a road, 300 kilometres through the length of the Spinifex Lands, before settling permanently at Tjuntjuntjara in 1989. Tjaruwa was adjudged to be about 32 years old in 1986 and was given the birth date 1/7/1954. At this point in time (2014),Tjaruwa’s family remains the last Aboriginal group in the country to make first contact with contemporary Australia.

It is difficult to even imagine the changes Tjaruwa was to encounter living in her new world. She had acquired an extended network of kin to establish relationships with, the daily activity of hunting and gathering was essentially replaced by the community store and water was abundant.

Tjaruwa’s immediate priority was to care for her mother and uncle living in their new circumstances and it was not until her mother passed away that she took up an interest in painting. At first she tended to paint as she observed other women painting and then the accumulated experience of her other life and her mother’s stories/designs poured out and Tjaruwa’s unique Spinifex perspective was translated with spectacular style and technique on to canvas.

Her artworks are in the following prestigious collections :

Art Gallery Of South Australia, Adelaide Sa (Women’s Collaborative)
National Gallery Of Australia, Canberra
National Gallery Of Victoria, Melbourne Vic (Women’s Collaborative)
Richard And Harriet England Collection
Seattle Art Museum, Seattle Usa (Women’s Collaborative)
The British Museum, London, England.(Womens Collaborative)
The Corrigan Collection, Australia
The Lepley Collection, Perth, Western Australia.
The Sims Dickson Collection, Nsw
Parliament House Art Collection, Canberra, Act (Womens Collaborative)
W. & V. Mcgeoch Collection, Melbourne, Vic.
The Berndt Collection, University Of Western Australia.