Artist: Bill Whiskey Tjapaltjarri | Title: Untitled | Medium: acrylic on canvas board | Dimensions: 40.6 x 40.6 cm
ARTWORK STORY
Bill Whiskey’s paintings were the first to depict the major Cockatoo Dreaming story and the creation of important sites throughout the country of his birth (Pirupa Alka near the Olgas - Kata Tjuta and Ayers Rock - Uluru), and are imbued with authority and steeped in traditional knowledge.
During the battle between the Cockatoo and the Crow, white feathers were scattered about and the landscape became indented by the entangled combatants crashing to the ground repeatedly. Subterranean streams filled these impressions with water and a circular amphitheatre was created by the sweep of wings. Today, a large, glowing white rock signifies the fallen cockatoo, still sipping the life-giving water from the sacred pools.
In Whiskey's emblematic works, blues, yellows, and reds, are tempered by cockatoo-white, representing the wildflowers that grow in profusion after rain. In keeping with the depiction of Dreaming stories throughout the Western Desert, the mythic and numinous is inherent within the sacred geography.
Artist Profile:
COMMUNITY/ REGION
Mount Liebig, NT
LANGUAGE
Pitjantjatjara
BIOGRAPHY
Pitjantjatjara people joined the Western Desert art movement during the 1990s, somewhat later than other tribes. They resisted the move to painting their sacred Dreaming Stories on canvas, for public display and sale. Perhaps this partly explains why Bill Whiskey developed his own interpretation of the ancient iconography, though keeping within the conventions of the contemporary ‘dot-painting’ style… Continue Reading
ARTWORK STORY
Bill Whiskey’s paintings were the first to depict the major Cockatoo Dreaming story and the creation of important sites throughout the country of his birth (Pirupa Alka near the Olgas - Kata Tjuta and Ayers Rock - Uluru), and are imbued with authority and steeped in traditional knowledge.
During the battle between the Cockatoo and the Crow, white feathers were scattered about and the landscape became indented by the entangled combatants crashing to the ground repeatedly. Subterranean streams filled these impressions with water and a circular amphitheatre was created by the sweep of wings. Today, a large, glowing white rock signifies the fallen cockatoo, still sipping the life-giving water from the sacred pools.
In Whiskey's emblematic works, blues, yellows, and reds, are tempered by cockatoo-white, representing the wildflowers that grow in profusion after rain. In keeping with the depiction of Dreaming stories throughout the Western Desert, the mythic and numinous is inherent within the sacred geography.
Artist Profile:
COMMUNITY/ REGION
Mount Liebig, NT
LANGUAGE
Pitjantjatjara
BIOGRAPHY
Pitjantjatjara people joined the Western Desert art movement during the 1990s, somewhat later than other tribes. They resisted the move to painting their sacred Dreaming Stories on canvas, for public display and sale. Perhaps this partly explains why Bill Whiskey developed his own interpretation of the ancient iconography, though keeping within the conventions of the contemporary ‘dot-painting’ style… Continue Reading
