Ngayurnangalku Baby

Yunkurra Billy ATKINS: artist

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Not On Display

About the work


“Ngayurnangalku [were] fighting, coming in from everywhere. They all come in here [at Kumpupirntily], all meet up here. Ngayurnangalku travelled through this Country going to Kumpupirntily. They made that Country. That Country got everything parngarra (goanna), karlaya (emu), dog, kangaroo, all there. And Ngayurnangalku… they're there too. [Now the] Ngayurnangalku cannibal [live] in a lake, Kumpupirntily. They live in the lake, in the salt lake, that mob. They belong to there. They been born there, they living there, sleeping there. Big mob! That’s his [their] Country, Kumpupirntily. This one the Ngayurnangalku camp, they all there. They got their own city underground. Nobody ever know. Just like a store, you can lock him up. They got a big room, have a rest. Underground, not far. All the man, women, liƩle kids, they all stopping there, and the mummy Ngayurnangalku, big mummy. All those little babies are his [hers]. There’s a hill there. They been walk all along here, they been get inside, that’s their hole over there. They all come and get in there. They got plenty jara (shield), yirrkili (boomerang), they property for the Ngayurnangalku, they maparn (holding power for sorcery). They hit you and kill you. He got to feed. Ngayurnangalku chuck away their jara and yirrkili when they go home. Pujurrpa (red ochre) there - that for Ngayurnangalku, make himself red, when he dance. They chuck them [boomerangs] in the afternoon. Before the wind. If it’s a wind blowing, no good, they all go in, in that rock (hill). Parla-parla (type of lizard) is Ngayurnangalku mate. He’s for Kumpupirntily that one. That’s for Ngayurnangalku. When you see that lizard come out, like this (making a smacking sound with its mouth) you gotta get away, you gotta go long way. Don’t come desert. Don’t stop, Ngayurnangalku be get up. Parla-parla make him get up this mob, you gotta go away, run away.” Ngayurnangalku still there [in Kumpupirntily]. They’re still alive. They walking in the night, they got to feed. They all staying there don’t go there! You’ll lose your life. We’ll be dead, he’ll be alive. No people gotta go come to this place. If they go there it's one way! There's a cannibal there. Don't come to this place- you might get killed! They gonna eat you for lunch! Don't go, keep away! I been block him, tell all the miners to keep away. Cannibal gonna come out of the lake, kill you, knock you on the head and have a feed. If they dig him up, anybody, blackfella, whitefella, they’ll get killed! They’ll have a good feed!” My grandfather went to Lake Disappointment chasing the dingo and he heard an old woman making a noise like howling, but she was crying for that dingo that my grandfather was spearing and chasing. So that woman grabbed his arm and put her long sharp fingernail through his wrist and paralysed him. She put her fingernail right through his wrist. Then that cannibal took him to a group of other cannibals, ready to cook him up to eat. They took him and had him there and they were singing him first. My grandfather is a strong maparn (magic) man. Lucky for him. He got out of there, because of his strength as a maparn.”
Title
Ngayurnangalku Baby
Artist/Maker and role
Yunkurra Billy ATKINS: artist
Date
2013
Medium
acrylic on linen
Measurements
92.0 x 93.0 cm
Credit line
Purchased through The Art Gallery of Western Australia Foundation: COVID-19 Arts Stimulus Package, 2020
The State Art Collection, The Art Gallery of Western Australia
Accession number
2020/0314

This is one of the paintings in our collection.



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