Kana-kurlangu Jukurrpa (Digging Stick Dreaming) Etching Cat DN-11

Date: 2004
Catalogue No: DN-11
Limited Edition: 50
Image Size: 59 x 46 cm
Paper size: 79 x 63 cm
Medium: Color aquatint with sugar lift aquatint
Paper: Somerset Satin White
Produced at: Crown Point Press, San Francisco
Printer: Crown Point Press
Publisher: Crown Point Press

Digging Sticks are very important for women as they are used as a utilitarian object when hunting and collecting food but also in ceremonies that correspond to abundance and fertility. They are often placed in a hole in the centre of the sand paintings on the ceremonial ground and painted with ochre.

In the Dreaming it is the songs that Napangardi/Napanangka women sang that caused the Desert Oak trees to come out of the ground, creating the first digging sticks at the site of Mina Mina in the western desert.