Eubena Nampitjin was a distinguished Wangkajunga elder, custodian of women's law, and the most senior woman artist at Balgo (Wirrimanu), whose vibrant paintings depicted her remote Great Sandy Desert homeland with profound cultural authority. Born at Tjinndjaldpa south of Jupiter Well, over 350 kilometres inland from Port Hedland, Nampitjin lived traditionally with minimal non-Indigenous contact until traveling to Old Mission in the late 1940s, moving to Wirrimanu in 1963 while regularly returning to country. Commencing painting in 1986 as women became more broadly included in Wirrimanu's art movement, her work featured in "Art from the Great Sandy Desert" (Art Gallery of Western Australia, 1986). With the formation of Warlayirti Artists in 1989, Nampitjin painted prolifically, often collaboratively with her husband, Wimmitji Tjapangarti, and her daughters. She won the prestigious Telstra National Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Art Award Open Painting prize in 1998. Her style evolved from strongly defined forms with complex dotted fields (1988-90) to exuberant colour manipulation and fluid compositions, depicting sacred sites, waterholes, and women's dancing tracks with rich, subliminal textures that conveyed her country's profound life and significance.
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Warlayirti Artists Western Australia
Works Available
Eubena Nampitjin
Nynmi, 2003
Eubena Nampitjin
Untitled - Karri Karri Rockhole, 1997
Relevant Exhibitions
Melbourne
REVERENCE 2025 | Melbourne
30 October - 7 January 2026
Melbourne
SUMMER | Melbourne
17 December - 12 February 2025
Sydney
REVERENCE 2024 | Sydney
28 November - 10 January 2025
Melbourne | Sydney | New York
SIGNIFICANT
7 May - 3 July 2025
Melbourne
REVERENCE 2023 | Melbourne
27 October - 1 December 2023
Melbourne
REVERENCE 2022
27 October - 3 December 2022
Melbourne
BALGO VISIONS
15 September - 28 October 2022
Melbourne
EUBENA
26 August - 7 October 2022
Melbourne
SIGNIFICANT 2023 - Part II | Melbourne
2 June - 21 July 2023
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