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This website was developed for the exhibition Irriṯitja Kuwarri Tjungu | Past & Present Together: Fifty Years of Papunya Tula Artists that was on view at the Kluge-Ruhe Aboriginal Art Collection of the University of Virginia from 2021-23 and the Embassy of Australia in Washington, DC in 2024. It was made possible by our creative partnership with Papunya Tula Artists and the generous support of UVA Arts Council. Site design by Urban Fugitive for V21 Artspace.
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Rubilee Napurrula

Yuwalki
2020

This painting represents a place called Yuwalki, which is known for its soakage. In the Tjukurrpa, a group of ancestral women traveled here to perform the dances and sing the songs connected to the place. They also spun handmade string from human hair to make nyimparra (hairstring belts), which are worn during ceremonies. As they continued their travels, the women gathered large quantities of pura (bush tomatoes). A fruit the size of a small apricot, pura can be eaten off the bush or sometimes they stored for long periods of time by removing the seeds, halving them and skewering them. The parallel lines in the painting represent the tali (sandhills) around Yuwalki, while the two single lines with shorter adjacent lines represent the hairstring belts. The ancestral women are represented by U shapes and the pura are represented by the many circles.

Language Group: Pintupi
Date: Born c. 1960

Rubilee Napurrula is the daughter of renowned Papunya Tula Artist, Wintjiya Napaltjarri. She was born in Ikuntji (Haasts Bluff) around 1960 before moving to Papunya where she went to school and subsequently married. She moved to Walungurru (Kintore) in the 1980s where she lives with her family. She began painting for Papunya Tula Artists in early 2007. Her sisters Clara and Aileen Napurrula also paint for Papunya Tula.

Are you related to this artist? Are you a scholar of artwork from the Papunya Tula movement? Please contact us at kluge-ruhe@virginia.edu if you would like to add something to this page or see something that is missing or incorrect.
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