TURKEY TOLSON TJUPURRULA - STRAIGHTENING SPEARS
TURKEY TOLSON TJUPURRULA
STRAIGHTENING SPEARS, 1999
152 x 182 cm
Synthetic Polymer Paint on Belgian Linen
REGION
Papunya Western Desert, NT
PROVENANCE
Papunya Tula Artists, NT, Cat No. TT990801
Private Collection, Vic
Accompanied by a certificate of authenticity from Papunya Tula Artists
STORY
Turkey Tolson joined Papunya Tula artists as one of its youngest members, painting his earliest artworks for Geoff Bardon in 1972. He was amongst the most innovative and figurative artists of the Papunya Tula movement’s early days.
Throughout the 1980s, Tolson’s unassuming leadership style and commitment to the community, combined with his individual approach, became the hallmarks of an enduring career. He introduced his Spear Straightening imagery around 1990 and returned to it again and again thereafter.
In this beautiful example, the horizontal bands of dots evoke the shimmering heat and vast distances of the artist’s desert country. In the Dreaming, the Mitukatjirri Men travelled from a claypan at Tjulula to Llyingaungau, a rocky outcrop far to the west of Alice Springs, where they made camp. A group of men entered the country from Tjikari, to the north. A fight ensued, after which the Mitukatjarri Men travelled to the nearby cave where they made their ceremonies. The parallel bands of dots represent spears, which the men straightened by warming the wood over a fire, bending it into shape as they waited for the men from Tjikari to arrive.
EXHIBITED
Tracing The Country, March 2023, Cooee Art | Redfern
ARTIST PROFILE
