Jukuna Mona Chuguna (Dec) - Nomad Art

Artist: Jukuna Mona Chuguna (Dec)
Art Centre: Mangkaja Arts
Region: Kimberley

Artwork Story

‘I paint my mother’s country and father’s. This is the country where I was living before. When I paint, it is this country that I am thinking about. In the hot weather time we lived in one place, near living water. We ate kangaroo and lots of different bush foods.

My feeling for my country comes from the stories too. When I was a young girl my mother and father and the old people taught me about Ngarrangkarni (Dreamtime). When I go to my country I think about my parents walking around the waterholes and the japi (features around waterholes which indicate the presence of Kalpurtu the water snake).

I like to go back to my country to see the waterholes. It is sad too because my father is buried there. I think about my country all of the time. I like to paint the desert, it makes me think about my parents. I paint my country, the waterholes and I give the name for the water, in the places where we used to walk.’