- Title: Chewnkey
- Artist: Mervyn Street
- Region: Kimberley
- Art Centre: Mangkaja Arts
- Medium: Lithograph
- Collection:
- Dimensions: 45 x 65 cm
- Edition Size: 20
- Price ($AUD): $ 360
Artwork Story
This is my father working. This is what it looked like before. There’s a bank on the side and the cattle would come in, he would keep the trough full for cattle to come in and drink. He never stopped working, so many cattle a day would come in and drink, morning, dinnertime, late afternoon, he would keep filling up the trough, that’s what he was doing, work work work. When the rain came and it would fill up the billabong, that’s the only time he stopped working. He had to use wire and trees to make sure the flood wouldn’t take the trough away. We had to live in a tent at that time, I was a kid and my Dad used to tell me ‘you stop in the camp and mind all the dogs and Mum’. The old man had to go to fill the trough every day, every morning. When there was no cattle around I used to go and play around there, it’s a good little place Chewnkey, three miles away from the station and the river. Those days there was no bore, we didn’t have a bore, we had to pump and get water from the soak to fill up the trough. In the wet when there was plenty of water he had to put fences up, and when it was dry he had to work on filling the trough.
Mervyn Street
Copyright for both painting and text remains with the artist and may not be reproduced without permission.