Ormay Nangala Gallagher / Water Dreaming – Mikanji (1A)

Artwork is accompanied by Warlukurlangu Artists (Yuendumu) Art Centre Certificate of Authenticity/Provenance

“I like painting my father’s and mother’s Jukurrpa, it makes me feel proud and happy.”

Ormay Nangala Gallagher was born in Alice Springs hospital, the closest hospital to Yuendumu, a remote Aboriginal community 290km from Alice Springs in the NT of Australia. Her upbringing was mainly in Yuendumu where she attended the local Yuendumu School. In 1978 she attended Yirara College, an Aboriginal boarding school in Alice Springs and between 1978 -1979 she attended Sadadeen College.

She then moved to Nyirripi where she worked at the Nyirripi store from 1986 to 1994. Between 1995 and 2004 she worked at Nyirripi School as a teacher. She did her teachers training through Batchelor College.

Ormay is married and has two children. She likes listening to country music, going bush hunting, enjoys watching TV, meeting friends and going on holidays around Australia.

“I started painting in the 1980’s and I am still painting today. I do dot painting and the dreaming that I paint is about Emu and Water, that dreaming is at Mikanji and that is my fathers dreaming. I also paint Pama-pardu and Emu, that dreaming is North of Nyirrripi at a place call Waylka and Wantungurru, which is also another of my fathers dreaming.”

Ormay travelled to Bahrain in 2008 and Delhi, India in 2009 with Warlukurlangu Artists.

The country associated with this Water Dreaming is Mikanji, a watercourse west of Yuendumu that is usually dry. There are soakages in this creek bed. The owners of this Dreaming site are Nangala / Nampijinpa women and Jangala / Jampijinpa men. Mikanji is an important water Dreaming site, and features in at least three different water Dreaming tracks.

In one story, the water Dreaming travelled from Puyurru, northwest of Yuendumu, to a soakage in the Mikanji creek. It unleashed a huge storm there. Two old blind women of the Nampijinpa skin group were sitting by the side of the soakages. As the two women strained their eyes to see the sky, tears formed in their eyes, creating the rain. Their spirits can still be seen at Mikanji in the form of two river red gums growing near the soakage.

In contemporary Warlpiri paintings, traditional iconography is used to represent the Dreaming, associated sites, and other elements. In many paintings of this Dreaming, short dashes are often used to represent cumulus & stratocumulus clouds, and longer, flowing lines represent flood waters. Small circles are used to depict soakages and river beds.