Papunya Tjupi Arts
Papunya Tjupi Arts is a 100% Aboriginal owned and directedcommunity arts organisation based in Papunya, the birthplace of theWestern Desert painting movement. The artists of Papunya Tjupi have establishedtheir own unique identity based on the legacy of their forefathers. TheArt Centre, located 250km NW of Alice Springs/Mparntwe, supports emergingartists and some of Australia’s leading contemporary painters.
It was established in 2007, in response to the vacuumfollowing the homelands movement of the late 1970s, which saw the exodus ofmany of the famous pioneer painters. Papunya Tjupi currently consists of 150artists from Papunya and surrounding outstations, who are renowned fortheir strong line-work and for continuously developing new ways totell the old stories.
Central to Papunya Tjupi is the understanding that paintingis an important part of culture and connection to country, and that theteaching and passing of knowledge is what keeps the community’s future strong.Papunya Tjupi’s artists exhibit fine art paintings nationally andinternationally and feature in major public and private collections.
Courtesy of Papunya Tjupi Arts
Artworks
Artist Profile/s
Candy Nelson Nakamarra
Candy Nelson Nakamarra was born in Yuendumu in 1964, daughter to renowned Papunya Tula artist Johnny Warangkula, who taught his children how to paint whilst passing down family stories. They all paint the Kalipinypa Water Dreaming story, of the rain and hail making ceremony, which Candy continues to explore and reinvent.
Candy has a distinct, evolving style, employing bold contrasting colours and layering of drips, drawing and outlining to create sophisticated, sought after contemporary works, which she says “look as if they are breathing, with the drawing elements popping out of the canvas’”. Candy represents tali (sandhills) and running water in her backgrounds, and uses dotting to represent hail storms and rain. Through drawing shapes and motifs, she represents the waterholes, running water, bush tucker, water birds and flowers present after a big storm and the wanampi (water snake) which lives under the waterhole.
Winner of the Interrelate Acquisitive Prize as part of the Wollotuka Acquisitive Art Prize (2012), her work is held in the Macquarie Bank Collection, Parliament House Canberra Collection and the Hassall Collection.
Courtesy of Papuna Tjupi