Dorothy Robinson Napangardi (c. 1956–2013) was an influential Pintupi/Warlpiri artist who developed a distinctive abstracted monochromatic style during her career. Born at Mina Mina in the Tanami Desert, in her early years she and her extended family lived on Country and had little contact with white people until 1957 when a patrol officer pressured the family to move to the settlement of Yuendumu. Napangardi eventually returned to Yuendumu where she had four daughters before moving to Alice Springs. In 1987 she began painting surrounded by other Warlpiri artists, making works featuring bush fruits and flowers in bright colours. She later developed a unique, minimalistic style of painting which focused on representations of her Country Mina Mina, tracking the topographical features as well as ancestral tracks through the landscape. In 2001 Napangardi was the winner of the Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Award and in 2002 the Museum of Contemporary Art held a solo exhibition of her work Dancing Up Country: The Work of Dorothy Napangardi.
From 2006 to 2010, Greg Weight travelled extensively through Central Australia meeting and photographing contemporary Pintupi and Warlpiri artists. This photograph of Napangardi is one of the portraits included in his resulting book Artists of the Western Desert (2011).
Gift of Patrick Corrigan AM 2020. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program.
© Gregory Weight/Copyright Agency, 2024
Patrick Corrigan AM (130 portraits)
On one level The Companion talks about the most famous and frontline Australians, but on another it tells us about ourselves.
Greg Weight on working with Jiawei Shen, and starting out as a photographer.
Portraits of philanthropists in the collection honour their contributions to Australia and acknowledge their support of the National Portrait Gallery.
