Megan Nampijinpa Kantamarra is a Pintupi Luritja woman, born on the 18 February, 2000, in Alice Springs Hospital, the closest hospital to her father’s country Watiyawanu (Mt Liebig) and her mother’s country, Papunya, remote aboriginal communities approximately 325 km west of Alice Springs in the NT of Australia. Megan spent her early years at Warren Creek, near Mt Liebig before attending Yirara College, a boarding school for Indigenous students from remote communities in the Northern Territory. She finished her education at Kormilda College, an Aboriginal boarding college in Darwin. When she finished school, she went to Nyirripi, a remote aboriginal community 168 km SW of Papunya to live with her grandmother, Maisie Napaljarri Campbell, a major Pintupi artist who began painting in Papunya.
Megan began painting with Warlukurlangu Artists Aboriginal Corporation, an Aboriginal owned and governed art centre located in Yuendumu and Nyirripi, in 2016. “I like colours and patterns . . . they make me happy . . . I paint my Grandmother’s Story”. Her grandmother’s country is Karrku – a large hill and the home of a sacred ochre mine (Mount Stanley), a 20-minute drive from Nyirrpi. Megan uses colour and patterns which she creatively combines to blend traditional motifs with her own ideas of modern design to represent her grandmother’s country.
Marapinti is a rock hole west of Kiwirrkurra. Where the country is flat, the Marapinti Jukurrpa tell the story of young women of all skin groups travelling between rockholes and the easternmost point on the Seven Sisters’ journey across Martu Country. The women travelled without men and they went to Milmilpa and Yaka Yaka east of Malpurri. As they journey through the landscape, singing and dancing towards Pintupi Country, the Minyipuru created waters and landforms. On reaching Marapinti, they pierced their noses, a practice known as marapinti. Today the Minyipuru can be seen there as a group of rocks, sitting up like women.
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Information by Warlukurlangu Artists (c)
