Kana-Kurlangu (Digging Sticks) 2004 by Dorothy Napangardi, 122x198cm Cat 7469DN

The first image is a closeup of the painting. Please click through the images to see the full painting and photo of the artist with the final work.

This painting depicts a major ceremonial site known as Mina Mina, the artist's custodial country, located near Lake Mackay in the Tanami Desert, north of Yuendumu in the Northern Territory.

During the Jukurrpa (creation period known as the Dreaming), ancestral women of the Napangardi and Napanangka kinship group, danced through their country, singing the world into existence.

Part of their song caused digging sticks to emerge from the ground and they remain as a forest of desert oak trees. These trees form an important part of the Women's Dreaming (Karntakurlangu Tjukurrpa) which translates as 'belonging to women').

Very slow growing, their root system is a third (at least) of the tree, reaching far down to access the water. These beautiful trees are quite majestic in this far west part of the central desert of Australia. One can understand the importance they hold in many dreaming stories.