Tjayanka Woods (d. 2014) was a senior Pitjantjatjara artist and cultural custodian. Born near Kalaya Piti in South Australia, as a child she lived a semi-nomadic life, hunting goannas, lizards and emu and gathering bush foods, travelling by foot, on donkeys and camels and in trucks. Having woven tjanpi, hair and feathers from a young age, she made sculptural, wearable and practical objects, selling her works through the Tjanpi Desert Weavers enterprise. In 2001, she and other senior artists established Irrunytju Arts in Wingellina, a remote Aboriginal community at the edge of the Gibson Desert, where she began painting. She later moved to the Papulankutja community (or Blackstone), working with Papulankutja Artists and inspiring the younger women in the community. Her acrylic on canvas paintings depict the Minyma Kutjara tjukurpa (Two Sisters Dreaming) and the Kungkarrangkalpa (Seven Sisters story).
Wiradjuri artist Karla Dickens' work is informed by dreamlike revelations of Country, but also issues of identity, gender politics, spiritualism and the environment. Dickens took this photograph of Mrs Woods in 2013, when the photographer spent a couple of weeks with her and other senior Pitjantjatjara artists researching the Seven Sisters story. The result of her visit was a multimedia work, Taking back the stars.
Purchased 2019
© Karla Dickens/Copyright Agency, 2023
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