fbpx

Find Us: 11 Knuckey St, Darwin City NT 0800

Email Us: art@aaia.com.au

Call Us: (08) 8981 1315

Aboriginal Fine Arts
  • All Artwork
    • Arnhem Land Artwork
    • Aboriginal Desert Art
    • WA Artwork
    • Bark Paintings
    • Large Aboriginal Paintings
    • Under $1000
  • Artefacts
  • Artists
  • Culture
  • More
    • Contact Us
    • Shipping Information
    • Refunds & Returns Policy
Menu
  • All Artwork
    • Arnhem Land Artwork
    • Aboriginal Desert Art
    • WA Artwork
    • Bark Paintings
    • Large Aboriginal Paintings
    • Under $1000
  • Artefacts
  • Artists
  • Culture
  • More
    • Contact Us
    • Shipping Information
    • Refunds & Returns Policy
Facebook Instagram
AUD $ 0.00 Cart

Yinarupa Nungala

 Born:             1955
 Born:             Mukula, west of Kiwirrkurra, WA
 State:            WA, NT.
 Region:           Western Desert
 Community:        Kiwirrkura
 Language:         Pintupi
  
 Subjects:         Her birthplace is Mukula in Western Australia. 

Yinarupa Nangala paints abstract aerial views of the ‘Ngamurru’ in Kiwirrkurra, Western Australia, a meeting place for Aboriginal women. Predominantly painted in black, white, and red, her works are composed of dots, lines, and circles with particular attention paid to the spacing and rhythm of their distribution. These forms serve as symbols representing rock holes (water sources in the desert), seeds, ceremonial objects, and geographic locations; her paintings are at once topographic depictions of the landscape and recordings of the very rituals that are enacted there.

Yinarupa Nangala is the daughter of the late Anatjari Tjampitjinpa. She was also the wife of the late Yala Yala Gibbs Tjungurrayi, a founding member of the Papunya Tula art movement. Along with her brother Ray James Tjangala, they both continue the contribution as artists as did their father. Yinarupa is a mother of 5 and currently resides in Alice Springs. She often visits her homelands near Jupiter Well in WA Yinarupa Nangala was a co-wife (with, amongst others, Ningura Napurrula, another Papunya Tula great) Yala Yala Gibbs. Thus, she is also related by marriage into George Ward Tjungurrayi’s and Willy Tjungurrayi’s families.

Yinarupa Nangalas contribution to Aboriginal art began in 1996 when she developed a distinctive style of weaving together her rich spiritual heritage as well as the physical environment of her homeland. Predominantly using black and white, Her paintings refer to the Dreaming path of a group of Tingari women who travelled through Mukula gathering bush foods. During ancestral times a large group of women came from the west and stopped at this site to perform the ceremonies associated with the area. The women, represented in the painting by the ‘U’ shapes, later continued their travels towards the east, passing through Ngaminya, Kiwirrkurra and Wirrulnga on their way to Wilkinkarra (Lake Mackay). As the women travelled, they gathered a variety of bush foods including kampurarrpa berries (desert raisin) from the small shrub Solanum centrale, and pura (bush tomato) from the plant Solanum chippendalei.
 The shapes in the painting represent the features of the country through which they travelled as well as the bush foods they gathered.

The sacred designs she paints have an intuitive sense of space and rhythm and are associated with the rockhole site of Mukula. These places are also sites with much food, and the women gather the seeds of the native Acacia. They collect the seeds and grind it into flour and eventually bake bread from this. Her paintings also commonly show Rockhole’s which are important water sources in the desert. Yinarupa’s unique art uses a combination of traditional and contemporary symbols providing an aerial view of the Pintupi area. This mixture ensures her work resonates with a contemporary audience of the traditional aspects of her culture. Her detailed rhythmic contemporary aboriginal art saw her win the prestigious ‘General Art Prize’ in 2009 at the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Awards, cementing her status as an acclaimed and talented artist.

Yinarupa received an honorable mention at the 2010, 36th Alice Art Prize – A National Contemporary Art Award.  She exhibited this year in Idaho, USA as part of an exhibition by Papunya Tula Artists, ‘Art of The Western Desert’. This collection of twenty-one paintings by senior and emerging artists from the remote desert communities of Kintore and Kiwirrkura will be the first exhibit of its kind held in the famous resort town of the pacific northwest region of the USA.

She has become highly collectable and her paintings are both valuable and works of great beauty.

She has been voted one of the top 50 Aboriginal Artists. Her paintings include water holes, hills and the stony areas, as well as bush foods. The tree like shapes that run across her paintings are the trees used to make spears. This is Yinarupa’s unique representation of the story that Turkey Tolsen and his sister, Mitjili Napurulla, paint (both of whom are also family).

Click here to view the Exhibitions, commissions, collections and awards

Awards:

2016    Finalist – 33rd NATSIAA, Darwin

2015    Finalist – 32nd NATSIAA, Darwin.

2014    Finalist – Wynne Prize, Art Gallery of NSW, Sydney.

2014    Finalist – 31st NATSIAA, Darwin.

2010    Finalist and Honourable Mention – Alice Prize, Alice Springs.

2010    Finalist – Western Australian Art Prize, Perth.

2009    Winner General Painting Award – 26th NATSIAA, Darwin.

2009    Finalist – Western Australian Art Prize, Perth.

2008    Finalist – 25th NATSIAA, Darwin.

2008    Finalist – TogArt Contemporary Art Award, Darwin Convention Centre, Darwin.

Collection:

Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney

National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne

The Luczo Family Collection, USA

Hank Ebes Collection, Melbourne

Exhibitions: Individual Exhibitions:

2007 – Yinarupa Nangala: Paintings From 2002-2007, John Gordon Gallery, Coffs Harbour, NSW.

Group Exhibitions:

2019 International Women’s Day, Kate Owen Gallery, Sydney

2019 Defining Tradition: the first wave & its disciples, Kate Owen Gallery, Sydney

2019 Pintupi Artists of the Western Desert, Japingka Gallery, Fremantle, WA

2018 Community IX, Utopia Art, Sydney

2018 Sydney Contemporary 2018, Carriageworks, Sydney

2017 Community VIII, Utopia Art, Sydney

2016 The Last Hurrah, Utopia Art, Sydney

2014 Community VI, Utopia Art, Sydney

2014 Tjukurrpa Ngaatjanya Maru Kamu Tjulkura – Dreaming in Black and White, ReDot Gallery, Singapore

2015 Wynners, Kate Owen Gallery, Sydney

2013 Painting Now, Utopia Art, Sydney

2012 Unique Perspectives: Papunya Tula Artists and the Alice Springs Community, Araluen Arts Centre, Alice Springs

2011 Thinking outside the square, Kate Owen Gallery, Sydney

2011 Papunya Tula Women’s Art, Maitland Regional Art Gallery, Maitland

2010 Stories from the Centre, Kate Owen Gallery, Sydney

2010 Papunya Tula Artists: Art of the Western Desert, Harvey Art Projects, Sun Valley

Page 2

2010 Desert Country, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide

2010 Ngurra Kutju Ngurrara – Belonging To One Country, ReDot Gallery, Singapore

2009 Nganana Tjungurrayi Tjukurrpa Nintintjakitja: We are Here Sharing our Dreaming, East Galleries, New York

2008 Ngurra Yurru Kulintjaku – Always Remembering Country, CCAE, Darwin

2008 Papunya Tula Artists 2008, Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi, Melbourne

2008 Darwin Aboriginal Art Fair, Darwin Convention Centre, Darwin

2008 Pintupi Art 2008, Tony Bond Aboriginal Art Dealer, Adelaide

2008 Pintupi – Mixed Exhibition, Papunya Tula Artists, Alice Springs

2007 Kiwirrkurra Women, Papunya Tula Artists, Utopia Art, Sydney

2007 Papunya Tula Woman, Suzanne O’Connell Gallery, Brisbane

2007 Aboriginal Art 2007, Scott Livesey Galleries, Melbourne

2007 Recent Paintings 2007, Cross Cultural Art Exchange, Darwin

2007 The Desert Mob Art Show, Araluen Art Centre, Alice Springs

2007 Rising Stars, Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi, Melbourne

2007 The Black and White Show, Red Dot Gallery, Singapore

2007 Pintupi Art 2007, Tony Bond Aboriginal Art Dealer, Adelaide

2007 Pintupi – Mixed Exhibition, Papunya Tula Artists, Alice Springs

2006 A Particular Collection, Utopia Art, Sydney

2006 Papunya Tula Artists – Recent Paintings, Harriet Place, Darwin

2005 Pintupi Women, Indigenart, Perth

2004 The Desert Mob Art Show, Araluen Art Centre, Alice Springs

2001 Spirituality and Australian Aboriginal Art, Comunidad de Madrid touring exhibition, Spain

Bibliography:

Espiritualidad y Arte Australiano Aborigen (‘Spirituality and Australian Aboriginal Art’) , 2001-2002, exhibition catalogue, Direccion General Promocion Cultural, Madrid, Spain.

Artworks

We are also a signatory to the Indigenous Australian Art Commercial Code of Conduct, which was recently introduced to promote fair and transparent dealings within the Industry.

Aboriginal Fine Arts Gallery is a founding member of the Australian Indigenous Art Trade Association, which was established to promote the ethical trade of indigenous art. 

Contact Us

  • (08) 8981 1315
  • +61 8981 1315
  • 11 Knuckey St, Darwin City NT 0800
  • Secure Order Form

opening Times

Dry Season

Monday – Friday: 9am – 4:30pm

Saturday: 9am – 2:30pm

Sunday: 9am – 2:30pm

Wet Season

Monday – Friday: 9:30am – 3:00pm

Saturday: 9:30am – 2:00pm

Sunday: Closed

subscribe to our mailing list

© 2021 - All rights reserved to AAIA Gallery - Online since 1994

Facebook