Eubena Nampitjin
| Born | 1st July 1921 | |
| Location | Tjinjadpa, West of Jupiter Well | |
| Skin | Nampitjin | |
| Language | Purtitjarra, Mantjilytjarra, | |
| Wangkajungka and Kukatja |
| Themes | ||||||||
| Tjumu | soak water | |||||||
| Tjukarra | rock holes | |||||||
| Watikujarra | two men dreaming | |||||||
| Malu | kangaroo dreaming | |||||||
| Kantilli | bush tomato | |||||||
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| Biography | |
| Eubena (Yupinya) is the best known of Warlayirti Artists' many painters. She is one of the most esteemed law women in the community, being consulted and deferred to on all questions of law. Mukaka, Eubena's mother, taught her Maparn (healer/witchdoctor) skills before she passed away, when Eubena was just a young girl. The family travelled and hunted, performing ceremonies and law for the upkeep of their country and their own spiritual preservation. Nomadic life was harsh and most of her extended family had passed away or moved to other parts of the country. Eubena talks of many 'sorry' times. | |
| Eubena with her husband and family travelled up the Canning Stock Route to Billiluna Station before following the mission as it moved around, until arriving at its present site at Balgo Hills. Before his death, her husband Gimme helped Father Piele with a Kukatja (Eubena and Gimme's second language) dictionary, to which Eubena also contributed. Today she is one of the few people alive who maintains a full vocabulary of this language. Despite living at the mission and tending herds of goats, Eubena continually traveled back to her country, living in and from the land for extended periods. Her extraordinary hunting instinct, which remains today, combines with an effortless energy when she is out in the country. | |
| Eubena started painting with her second husband Wimmitji in the mid 1980s. Their work shared a luminous and intricate complexity along with a love of the warm reds, oranges and yellows that continues to be Eubena's signature today. Eubena's reputation grew, as one half of the famous painting duo at Balgo, but also as a solo artist in her own right. Eubena has a spontaneity and strength of brush mark that carves the paint, leaving rhythmical tracks across the canvas. Her work resonates with the power of place and pride in country that Eubena has been able to maintain throughout her life, a life that has evolved from hard, proud desert nomad to an artist feted in Australia and overseas. A regal character, she is both iron strong and unfailingly generous. Painting is like her second language and she paints persistently with passion and dedication. | |
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| Collections | |
| Gantner Myer Collection Art Gallery of New South Wales Kaye Archer Collection National Gallery of Australia National Gallery of Victoria The Holmes a Court Collection The Kelton Foundation, Santa Monica, USA Laverty Collection Kluge Ruhe Collection, USA Helen Read Collection ArtBank Western Mining Corporation Collection Levi-Kaplan Collection, Seattle Williams Collection Thomas Vroom Collection, Amsterdam Harland Collection Ken Thompson and Pierre Marecaux Collection |
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| Awards | ||
| 1998 | Winner of Telstra Open Painting Award, 15th National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Awards, Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory, Darwin | |
| Bibliography | ||
| 2002 | McCulloch, S. The World from a Feminine Perspective, The Australian, 25 March | |
| 2001 | Borham, Susan (Editor-in-chief), Australian Art Collector Issue 15, Jan-March 2001, Australia's 50 Most Collectable Artists (p.57); Collector's Dossier: Yupinya Nampitjin (p.100), Gadfly Media Publications, Sydney | |
| 1995 | Brody, A., Krempel, U., Bahr, E., (eds), Stories, Eine Reise zu den grossen Dingen, exhibition catalogue, Sprengel Museum Hannover, Germany | |
| 1994 | Dream Journeys Calendar, image reproduction | |
| 1994 | Johnson, V., The Dictionary of Western Desert Artists, Craftsman House, East Roseville, NSW | |
| 1991 | Glowczewski, B., Yapa Peintres Aborigenes de Balgo et Lajamanu, Lebon Gallery, Paris | |
| 1989 | Ryan, J., Mythscapes: Aboriginal Art of the Desert from the National Gallery of Victoria, exhibition catalogue, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne | |
