VARIOUS ARTISTS

Painted for the Spinifex Arts Project at Ilkurlka/Tjuntjuntjura in 2008. Please refer to previous lot

The work is framed in a timber shadow box and appears in good and stable condition. There are a number of hairs embedded in the painted surface.
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Planning for a painting that could appropriately represent all the country owned by the Spinifex People was a complicated exercise. The painting needed to reflect the density and complexity of cultural knowledge whilst also acknowledging the sheer range of territory that the Spinifex People are responsible for. Ultimately four senior men, Lawrence Pennington, Roy Underwood, Jerome Anderson and Billy Anderson produced the work although several other older men were involved in laying out the story(s), elaborating the documentation and confirming the sequence of place.

Generally this painting shows the vast movements of Kalaya (Emu) as they split and enter Spinifex lands from the west (overall, this story emerges far to the west at Bondini near Wiluna) and ultimately congregate at a site widely known as Kalaya Piti. The Kalaya story splits into three major 'columns' and each of these pass across several major sites undertaking a range of actions and being the subject of various actions as they travel. All three columns and the major sites of events are shown in this work. Because the Kalaya Men are travelling with juniors and new initiates on initiation business there are many specific components of the painting that cannot be elaborated or discussed publicly.

Perhaps owing to the sheer weight of its presence across the Spinifex lands the Wati Kutjara (Two Men) story bursts into thispainting from the south. A father and son, also travelling on initiation business are here shown heading from Pukera towards Mulaya. The father, concerned that his son is getting "dangerous" around the people who have been teasing him is chaperoning him away. Unbeknownst to the father, his son will soon be involved in a fight with a powerful old snake that lives at Mulaya. As shown in this work these two snakes come across this vast movement of emus and hence these two major Spinifex stories converge although the Emus are wary and hurry away. The Wati Kutjara are busy with their own journey and do not interrupt the movement of the Kalaya.

Ultimately the Kalaya, by now travelling in a very heightened state of ritual excitement converge on Kalaya Piti and "go in". The Kalaya story and the Kalaya themselves are said to "finish" in this place.

Sotheby's wishes to thank Neil Murphy for this catalogue entry