About Kunmanara (Ngupulya) Pumani (1948-2019)

Ngupulya Pumani was an Australian Aboriginal artist born 1948 in Mimili, in the north-west of South Australia. Part of a well-known family of artists, who belong to the Yankunytjatjara community, her mother Milatjari and her sister Betty Kuntiwa, are both successful painters. Ngupulya has paintings held in the National Gallery of Victoria and the Art Gallery of New South Wales. Inspired to paint by her mother, Ngupulya began painting in 2009 at Mimili Maku, Mimili's community art co-operative. Her first major exhibition was later that year in Alice Springs, at the annual "Desert Mob" show. Since then, her paintings have been exhibited in several cities around Australia, including twice at the Gallery Gabriella Pizzi in Melbourne. Ngupulya's paintings depict scenes and concepts from her family's Dreaming. Her mother's ngura (homeland) is Antara, and her father's is near Watarru. Antara is a sacred place associated with the Maku Tjukurpa (Witchetty Grub Dreaming), and Ngupulya most often paints stories from this Dreaming. She uses pale, earthy colours in her backgrounds to depict the desert landscape, and this is contrasted with patterns of intense, bright dots and lines to represent symbols, figures and their journeys. Many of her techniques were taken from her mother, but used more consistently with her own refinements.