Punttu family

Punttu is an exhibition of sixteen portraits on permanent display at Nyinkka Nyunyu in Tennant Creek that were produced to explain the Warumungu system of skin relationships. From 2005 to 2007 a set of the portraits went travelling, hosted by Artback NT and the following essay is an extract from the catalogue accompanying the exhibition.

In 1995 the Warumungu community of Tennant Creek decided to initiate the development of an art and culture centre, Nyinkka Nyunyu, which opened in 2003. After several years of consultation, research and discussion, five key themes were decided upon to make up the backbone of the interpretive display for the centre. They were bush tucker and resources, land, language, history and punttu.

The sixteen portraits in the exhibition punttu were developed by the Warumungu community to personalise the concept of punttu or family for a non-Indigenous audience. Rather than complicated diagrams with arrows and names that are confusing for non-Indigenous people, it was decided that if an audience could see a wide variety of people, of all ages and interests they would perhaps come closer to understanding that punttu is a concept that is fundamental to Warumungu people in Tennant Creek. The exhibition also addresses issues of identity, history and contemporary life.

Jerry Frank Juppurla (Portrait 11) was born in 1979, nine years after the death of the famous rock ‘n roll guitarist Jimi Hendrix and by drawing himself in a Jimi Hendrix t-shirt, Juppurla has aligned himself with men the world over that love rock ‘n roll. It is an image that is recognisable immediately to whole generations, but this time with a twist. The screen print hasn’t been released by a multi-national recording company, but by a Warumungu artist from Tennant Creek. It is an image that connects the artist with an international community of people who are Hendrix fans, although the artist is connected, by his punttu, to the Warumungu community as well.

Dancing off the page with one hand raised in greeting Michael Jampin Jones (Portrait 8) has drawn himself as a young man in the rig of a stockman, complete with saddles over a rail. It is an image that is well known to many indigenous people in the Northern Territory and perhaps to an urban Australian population, through television documentaries like the ABC’s ‘A Big Country’. In Jampin’s youth, young boys were thrown into the saddle, and a life of working with cattle began. Skilled stock work was highly valued, and although the lifestyle was hard, as one old man said ‘it was fun’. Jampin’s portrait brings this celebration of hard work and skill across to the viewer.

The portraits by both Harold Morrison Jakkamarra (Portrait 7) and Kerry Waistcoat Nappanangka (Portrait 6) show young Warumungu people living in Tennant Creek as they see themselves today. Harold’s portrait is reminiscent of an action hero, an animated character about to leap out of the screen of a wild cartoon. It is a no-holds-barred expression of ownership, ‘don’t mess with me’ attitude. Kerry’s drawing shows a young woman ready to go out for a night on the town, a common event for young people in Tennant Creek. Though the imagery by Morrison and Waistcoat may not be seen as ‘traditional’, differing widely from the profile of a stereotyped Aboriginal person seen on countless t-towels in souvenir shops, they are nevertheless informing us that appearances can be deceptive. The people portrayed in these two prints are both living within the boundaries of Aboriginal law, observing and reflecting on punttu.