Artiste : Kanta Donnegan

Titre de l'œuvre : Minyma Tjuta

Format : 110 × 85 cm

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

Référence de cette peinture : 22-148

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Explications pour cette œuvre :

Kanta (1944) Kanta was born at Kapi Piti􀀁Kutjara, the place where Wati􀀁Kutjara (Two Serpent Men) emerged and headed for Pukara.

This painting belongs to the Kungkarangkalpa Tjukurpa, a major Western Desert Tjukurpa  also known as the Seven Sisters. Tjukurpa is the Pitjantjatjara concept for describing the formative creation where ancestral beings create the world. These beings are Anangu ancestors, who can take the form of people, plants or animals. They traverse the country; forming the world we live in, creating the waterholes, the trees, the clay pans, the rocky outcrops, the sand hills and the Spinifex plains. These land formations are the physical manifestation of the creation energy and tangible evidence that this Tjukurpa is true. This Tjukurpa of the Seven Sisters is an epic songline in the Western Desert and tells the story of many women traveling throughout the desert hunting and carrying out ritual obligations all the while being pursued by a cheeky old man in pursuit of a wife. Nyiru the man,  is capable of changing form and does this on occasion in order to trick the women. Many parts of the story are secret and involve a sexual element. Only the public details of this story are allowed to be put down in paint. At Tjitjiti the young girls were ritualistically pu􀀅ng the salty water onto their nipples.

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)