Mick Namarari Tjapaltjarri

ONE OF PAPUNYAS' MOST LOVED CHARACTERS

Born at Marnpi in Pintupi country, Mick belonged to a nomadic family who would walk on foot from camp site to camp site in the harsh Australian outback^¹. His parents were killed at an early age by a revenge party and as a consequence he was brought up by relatives^². In 1971 he was one of several Papunya councillors who became founding members of Papunya Tula Artists. He was awarded the National Australian Aboriginal Art Award in 1991 and in 1994 the Australia Council's prestigious Red Ochre Award. Mick, Long Jack, George Ward and Pansy Napangarti have been included in a group exhibition now at the National Museum of Australia entitled Papunya Tula: Out of the Desert –a homage to the founding artists of Contemporary Aboriginal Art.

2008 marks the 10^th anniversary since the passing away of Mick – one of the most loved characters of Papunya Community. Geoffrey Bardon remembers him as a humble man who: “[...] worked with single-mindedness and lived by himself, happily, it seemed, in a traditional house. Mick was very comfortable as the star of my film Mick and the Moon (1979). The story told how an Aboriginal believed he owned the moon, and how his duty was to paint ceremonial pictures to fulfil his belief.”^³

The work present in this exhibition is an eloquent example of early, traditional Papunya dot painting by one of the key figures of the original group that sparked the beginning of Contemporary Aboriginal Art. The painting has been exhibited at the Four Seasons Hotel in Singapore and at Corbally Stourton Contemporary Art, London.^⁴

1Isaacs, J, Spirit Country p.46

2 The last of these brutal events was that of the Coniston Massacre in 1928 where some estimate as many as 110 innocent men and women killed Strenhlow, TGH. Land of the Altjira, 319

3Bardon, G. Papunya Tula: Art of the Western Desert, 1991 - p.84 [In this publication one of the artworks illustrated was used for the film.]

4 Corbally Stourton P 1996 Songlines and Dreamings Lund Humphries London p.113 pl.118.

PAINTINGS CURRENTLY IN STOCK

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