Lot 78: PADDY TJAMATJI (JAMPIN) , CIRCA 1912-1996 UNTITLED - DREAMINGS ON BEDFORD DOWNS Natural earth pigments and natural binder on canvas

Natural earth pigments and natural binder on canvas

89.5 by 152.5 cm

Commissioned by Chips Mackinolty at Warmun, Turkey Creek in 1985
Private collection, acquired from the above

Cf. For paintings of the half-kangaroo by the artist, see an untitled painting executed in 1982 in the Berndt Museum of Anthropology Collection, in Stanton, J. E., Painting the Country: Contemporary Aboriginal art from the Kimberley region, Western Australia, The University of Western Australia Press, Nedlands, 1989, p.35, pl.31; Tawurr the kangaroo at Kanmanturr, c.1978, in the collection of the National Museum of Australia, in Taylor, L. (ed.), Painting The Land Story, National Museum of Australia, Canberra, 1999, p.31, pl.9; and Mythological kangaroo, Kimberley (Elgee Cliffs, Bedford Downs), 1983, in the Holmes à Court Collection, in Akerman, K., "I bin paintin' first." Paddy Jaminji - trail-blazing artist of the Warmun school of Aboriginal art, Holmes à Court Gallery, Perth, 2004, illus A compendium of images of ancestral beings and sites in the area of Bedford Downs station including places referred to in the Gurirr Gurirr song cycle. Tawurr, the ancestral kangaroo whose bones rest in a cave on Kanmanturr (Elgee Cliffs) appears as a painting on the cave wall, the lower half of which has been eroded or washed away, thus only the upper half of the ancestor is depicted. Alongside Tawurr is Galiru the Rainbow Serpent and a crocodile. See Number 14 in the Gurirr Gurirr song cycle as recorded by the owner of the ceremony, Rover Thomas in Thomas, R. et al, Roads Cross: The paintings of Rover Thomas, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, 1994, p.26