Maisie Nungarrayi Ward was born in 1975 in Papunya, located 168km south east of Nyirripi. and roughly 240km northwest of Alice Springs. She went to Kintore School before going to Yirara College, an Aboriginal boarding college in Alice Springs. When she finished school, she returned home to look after her little sisters.
She began in 2014. She paints both Women’s Jukurrpa and her father’s Kurrkara Jukurrpa (Desert Oak Dreaming), stories passed down over thousands of years and related to her land, its features and the plants and animals that inhabit it. “When I do that painting . . . like it makes me feel happy.”
She lives in Nyirripi with her partner Donald Brown. When she is not painting she likes to play sport.
