Cindy Nampijinpa Mandijarra, Wardapi Jukurrpa (Goanna Dreaming) - Yarripurlangu, 30x30cm

• Artist - Cindy Nampijinpa Mandijarra
• Community - Yuendumu 
• Art Centre/Community organisation - Warlukurlangu Artists Aboriginal Corporation
• Catalogue number - 4538/17
• Materials - Acrylic on pre-stretched canvas  
• Size(cm) - H30 W30 D3.5  
• Postage variants - Artwork posted stretched and ready to hang
• Orientation - Painted from all sides and OK to hang as wished

This Wardapi Jukurrpa (goanna [Varanus gouldii] Dreaming) comes from Yarripilangku, south-west of Yuendumu. It tells the story of a group of Karnta (Warlpiri women) that were sitting down in a circle. A man from Mt. Theo, of the Japangardi skin group named Wamaru, came up to the women. He wanted to take a girl of the wrong skin, a Nungarrayi. He took the Nungarrayi woman, named Yurlkurinyi, and went up the hill where they made love. Then the earth turned to Ngunjungunju (yellow and white ochre) and the man turned himself and all the ‘karnta’ (women) into ‘wardapi’ (goannas). The ochre is still found on top of the hill and is used today for love magic and for ceremonial decoration. This Jukurrpa belongs to the Napaljarri/Japaljarri and Nungarrayi/Jungarrayi subsections. It also belongs to people from Mt Theo of the Japanangka/Napanangka, Japangardi/Napangardi subsections. In paintings of this Jukurrpa, the group of women is often represented by concentric circles and ‘U’ shapes typically are used to represent women. Concentric circles can also illustrate ‘wardapi’ holes and the droppings they leave while ‘wardapi’ tracks are usually represented by ‘W’ shapes.

Cindy Nampijinpa Mandijarra was born in 1994, in Derby, a town in the Kimberley region of Western Australia, 926 km from Wirrimanu (Balgo), a remote aboriginal community located on the boundary between the Great Sandy Desert and the Tanami Desert of central and Western Australia. She spent her early years in Wirrimanu Balgo, where her father and grandmother live and in Halls Creek, a town in Western Australia, where her mother lives. Her Grandma is Lena Mandijarra, who paints with Warlayirti Artists Aboriginal Corporation located in the small Indigenous community of Wirrimanu (Balgo). Cindy attended school in both Balgo and Halls Creek. When she finished school, she worked at the Clinic in Balgo.

Cindy often visits her extended family and friends in Yuendumu. When she visits she enjoys painting with the Warlukurlangu Artists Aboriginal Corporation, an Aboriginal owned and governed art centre. She paints her grandmother’s Ngapa Jukurrpa (Water Dreaming), stories that have been passed down to her by her parents and their parents before them for millennia.

When Cindy is not working or painting she plays basketball with friends.