This painting is about the Tingarri Men who move through Pintupi Country around Lake Mackay [Wilkinkarra], and across the desert beyond. Artist Linda Syddick was adopted and raised by Shorty...
This painting is about the Tingarri Men who move through Pintupi Country around Lake Mackay [Wilkinkarra], and across the desert beyond. Artist Linda Syddick was adopted and raised by Shorty Lungkarta Tjungurrayi, one of the last senior Pintupi men to join the Papunya painting group in the early 1970s. A ngangkari (traditional healer), he was renowned for his hunting skills, ceremonial knowledge and his spirited dancing. A kindly father to all his children, he taught his eldest and adopted daughter Linda Tjunkaya Syddick Napaltjarri, and Wentja Morgan #2, Pamela Napaltjarri and Martha the orphaned Benny (Pinny) Tjapaltjarri to paint. Tingarri Song and Ceremonial cycles, traversing vast deserts embed Warlukirritji in a much broader web of Law, interconnecting people, species and places. Tingarri Ancestors, human/animal, male/female, interact, live, love and die, transgress, transform, fight, and give succour, perform ceremonies, and create geophysical and geographical site features. Tingarri also modify previously isolated sites, reviving and extending more ancient and localised traditions, as occurs at Warlukirritji. Tingarri oral narratives stretch to thousands of verses, broken into different sections, held by different people, at different sites. They provide countless topographical details that assist in navigation and survival. Law enshrined in song cycles, connecting these diverse linguistic/cultural groups across vast distances. Public versions disclose no secret sacred knowledge, and Tingarri-related visual designs are usually considered dear to Pintupi families, rather than dangerous. Warlukirritji is part of one of three major Tingarri journey/song lines that traverse the Country and travels from near Walungurru [Kintore], doubling back to Karrkurutinyja and then to Ikuntji [Haasts Bluff].