In 2001, while living at Kiwirrkurra, Patrick Tjungurrayi began a series of austere black-and-white works. These were in stark contrast to the bright palette of pinks, oranges and yellows that he had refined working through at the Warlayirti Art Centre at Balgo. One of Patrick's black-and-white works, Illyatjarta (2001), which is now held in the Hood Museum of Art, was awarded the General Painting Prize at the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Awards. Anthropologist John Carty has described this series of paintings as pivotal turning points in Tjungurrayi's career:
We can think of it as both the end of one process and the foundation stone of another; because what he did would mark a major development in contemporary painting. Gradually his Balgo and Kiwirrkurra practices–with their separate emphases on color and composition–would merge.
Language Groups: Pintupi and Munkultjarra
Dates: 1935–2017
Patrick Oloodoodi Tjungurrayi was born in the bush at Puptutalpa near Puntujarrpa. His first contact with "white men" took place along the Canning Stock Route in 1957, and subsequently he and his family went to live at the Catholic mission at Balgo Hills. When the first Pintupi homelands community was established at Walungurru (Kintore) in the early 1980s, Patrick and his family stayed there. After a few years in Walungurru, Patrick traveled around country doing various jobs such as building houses, working on boats, and carrying sandbags. When the labor became too strenuous, he settled down in Wirrimanu (Balgo) and began painting for Warlayirti Artists beginning around 1986. Already an established artists through Warlayirti, he began painting regularly for Papunya Tula Artists after moving to Kiwirrkurra in the early 1990s. Patrick’s work was included in the landmark exhibition Papunya Tula: Genesis and Genius curated by Hetti Perkins at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. In 2001 he was awarded the Telstra General Painting Prize at the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Awards and in 2008 he took out first prize in the Western Australian Indigenous Art Awards. Patrick was a driving force in the establishment of the Purple House to provide dialysis for patients in remote desert communities. In 2015 his art and life was the subject of a major monograph Patrick Tjungurrayi: Beyond Borders.
PATRICK TJUNGURRAYI, Tjiparitjarra, 2001
Synthetic polymer paint on canvas. 48 × 24 in. (122 × 61 cm). Collection of Richard Klingler and Jane Slatter.
© estate of the artist licensed by Aboriginal Artists Agency Ltd for Papunya Tula Artists Pty Ltd.
Patrick Tjungurray.
© Papunya Tula Artists.