Katjarra Butler

AUSTRALIAN. PINTUPI, B. 1946

Tjarlirli Art Center

Written by Elizabeth Marrkilyi (Katjarra's niece). Katjarra was born quite close to Kulkurta and Purrungu at a place called Kuun. Kuun is the name of the waterhole there. Kuun is also the name of the yellow ocher. There is also a place very close to Kuun that Katjarra refers to as her home and is one of her Tjukurrpa or dreaming which she paints. It is called Kuurmankutja. This place is home to the two Kuniya (python) dreaming. The other dreaming that she paints is Marrapirn. Her father was Lilyiwara Tjungurrayi and her mother was Mangkatji Nangala. Katjarra had an older sister Nguya Napaltjarri and younger brother Peter Tjanpaltjarri, now both deceased. Katjarra lived with her parents, siblings and immediate family in the bush as a child, teenager and young married woman. She lived with her family and later with her husband in the country to the west of Tjukurla in the Kulkurta area which is south of the Baron Range in Western Australia. Katjarra lived a traditonal nomadic lifestyle only, traveling families within their family's country and lived off the animals that they hunted and bush food that they collected. They collected and drank water from the rock holes, soakages, springs and claypans (waterholes). All the traveling was done on foot.

AWARDS AND PRIZES
2016 Winner Wyndham Art Prize 2016, Wyndham Art Gallery, Melbourne VIC

COLLECTIONS
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne VIC
Araluen Arts Centre Collection, Alice Springs NT

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Johnson, V. 2008, Lives of the Papunya Tula Artists, IAD Press Alice, Springs NT