LINDA SYDDICK NAPALTJARRI BIG 150x90CM NAT GALLERY AUST

LINDA SYDDICK NAPALTJARRI (c1937-)

FOUR TIMES BLAKE PRIZE FINALIST

TELSTRA PEOPLES CHOICE AWARD, NATSIAA 2006

FINALIST NATSIAA 2000 & 2008

RUNNER UP 1996 NATIONAL INDIGENOUS HERITAGE AWARD

Designed one of the ceiling paintings for the Star City Casino, Sydney 

VALUABLE & COLLECTABLE PINTUPI ARTIST

Collections

Musee des Confluences, Lyon, France

National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide
Museum & Art Gallery of Northern Territory, Darwin
Araluen Art Centre, Alice Springs
Art Gallery Of New South Wales, Sydney
Bernt Museum of Anthropology, Bernt

Auckland City Art Gallery, Auckland, NZ

The Kelton Foundation, Santa Monica, USA

Linden Museum, Stuttgart, Germany

National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne

Linda Syddick is a Pintupi woman who was born at Lake MacKay in the Gibson Desert, WA, in 1937. Her Aboriginal name is Tjunkiya Wukula Napaltjarri. Linda was raised in the traditional nomadic fashion until the age of eight or nine, when her family walked out of the desert and decided to settle at the Lutheran Mission at Haasts Bluff, NT.

Linda's paintings are inspired by both her traditional nomadic life in the desert , and the Dreamings of her father and step-father. Linda's father was Rintje Tjungurrayi and was he killed by a revenge spearing party in accordance with customary Law when Linda was about eighteen months old; she was subsequently brought up by her stepfather, artist Lankata Shorty Tjungurrayi. Before Lankata died in 1985, he instructed Linda to carry on his work and paint his Dreamings. And so it was that in 1986 Linda was taught the art of painting by her two Uncles Uta Uta Tjangala and Nosepeg Tjupurrula.

Linda paints country mostly around Lake MacKay, which has been central to the cultural and spiritual life of the Pintupi people for thousands of years. People used to camp around its shores during their seasonal journeys and gather there for ceremonies. Lake MacKay was where Linda was born and travelled for most of her early childhood. it is a large dry salt lake which straddles the WA-NT border, north-west of Kintore. Occasionally it fills with water and becomes blue, 'like sea water'. When this occurs birds and animals flock to the area.

Linda incorporates many perspectives and stories into a single painting. The land and country are always portrayed in an aerial perspective, the way of traditional Pintupi sand paintings, but the figures are painted straight on, like they would appear if painted on a cave wall. The spirits that Linda paints are very important and are based on the spirits that are depicted in the rock art at Tjindara, a place deep into WA from Lake MacKay which is often visited by Pintupi people. These paintings are reputed to be more than fifteen thousand years old.

THE PAINTING 

'Ochre Pits at Jupiter Well'

HUGE 150 x 90 CM

(Including black around main body of painting)

ATELIER ACRYLICS ON HAND PRIMED LINEN

CERTIFICATE OF AUTHENTICITY

PHOTO'S ON CD OF LINDA WORKING ON, SIGNING & HOLDING THE PAINTING

SIGNED BY LINDA (VERSO)